The origin of rice cakes can be traced back to a long time ago, and their production relied entirely on manual labor. Today, the emergence of fully automated rice cake production lines has completely revolutionized the traditional production model, ushering in a new era of high efficiency and precision for rice cake production. Take a complete modern production line as an example; it mainly consists of the following key components.
Raw Material Processing
Rice Washing: The carefully selected rice enters the rice - washing equipment through a precise feeding device. The rice - washing device uses advanced water - flushing technology, which can quickly and thoroughly remove the bran, discolored rice grains, and other impurities on the surface of the rice, ensuring that the purity of the rice entering the subsequent processes reaches a high standard. This step lays a solid foundation for the production of high - quality rice cakes.
Rice Soaking and Grinding: The washed rice is put into the soaking device and soaked under specific time and humidity conditions, allowing the rice to fully absorb water and become softer for subsequent grinding. After soaking, the drained rice is transported to a high - precision flour mill. The flour mill can grind the rice into powder with a fineness between 60 - 120 mesh according to different product requirements. For example, for rice cake products that require a more delicate taste, the rice flour will be ground to a finer degree. During this process, the automated control of the equipment ensures the stability of the fineness of the rice flour, avoiding quality fluctuations caused by differences in manual operations.
Shaping and Initial Drying
Steaming and Kneading: Rice flour, starch, and various carefully proportioned auxiliary materials enter the steaming machine in precise ratios. The steaming machine fully cooks and blends these raw materials in a high - temperature and high - pressure environment, changing the molecular structure of the rice flour and other raw materials, making them more flexible. Subsequently, the steamed raw materials enter the kneading machine, which imitates the action of manual kneading and kneads the raw materials repeatedly to further enhance their viscosity and toughness, preparing them for the subsequent shaping process. Throughout this process, parameters such as the temperature, pressure, kneading time, and strength of the equipment are precisely controlled by computer programs to ensure that each batch of raw materials achieves the kneading effect.
Shaping: The well - kneaded rice dough is transported to an advanced rice cake shaping machine. The shaping machine evenly presses the dough into a rice sheet of a certain thickness through pressing rollers, and this thickness can be precisely adjusted according to product design. Then, the rice sheet enters various shaping molds. Under high - speed stamping, the molds cut the rice sheet into the required shapes, such as the common round or square shapes. After cutting, the formed rice cake blanks are automatically separated from the waste skin. The waste skin is returned to the secondary extruder through the recycling device for re - processing and utilization, greatly improving the utilization rate of raw materials.
First - stage Drying and Second - stage Drying: After shaping, the rice cake blanks enter the stage dryer. The stage dryer uses hot - air circulation technology. By precisely controlling the temperature and wind speed, the rice cake blanks gradually remove part of the moisture in a suitable environment, achieving the effect of initial drying and preparing for the subsequent baking process. The blanks after the stage drying then enter the second - stage dryer for further deep drying. The temperature and drying time of the second - stage dryer are more strictly controlled. Through this step, the moisture content of the rice cake blanks is precisely controlled within an appropriate range, ensuring the stability of the rice cakes during subsequent processing and laying the foundation for their final crispy texture.
Puffing, Flavoring, and Final Drying
Puffing: The rice cake blanks after the second - stage drying enter the puffing equipment through a dedicated conveying device. The puffing equipment usually works on the principle of high temperature and high pressure. When the rice cake blanks enter the equipment, the high - temperature environment inside causes the moisture in the blanks to rapidly vaporize and expand. The huge expansion pressure instantly breaks through the structural constraints of the blanks, making their volume increase rapidly, the texture become fluffy and crispy, and at the same time, emitting a rich rice aroma. This puffing process not only gives rice cakes their unique taste but also makes their nutrients more easily digestible and absorbable by the human body.
Oil Spraying and Sugar Spraying (Flavoring): Puffed rice cakes need to be oil - sprayed. The oil - spraying machine evenly sprays an appropriate amount of edible oil on the surface of the rice cakes through precise nozzles, making the rice cakes more crispy and delicious and also increasing the product's gloss. For rice cakes, sugar spraying is a crucial process. Driven by high - pressure gas, the sugar - spraying machine evenly sprays fine sugar frost on the surface of the rice cakes, forming that iconic "snow - like" layer, which not only enhances the sweetness of the rice cakes but also makes their appearance more appealing. For some rice cakes with special flavor requirements, such as seafood - flavored or spicy - flavored ones, corresponding seasonings will be added through a flavor - attaching machine at this stage to meet the diverse taste needs of consumers.
Third - stage Drying and Packaging: After sugar spraying or flavoring, the rice cakes enter the third - stage dryer for the final drying treatment. The temperature and humidity control of the third - stage dryer is more precise, ensuring that the moisture content of the rice cakes reaches the state, thus maintaining their crispy texture for a long time. After the third - stage drying, the rice cakes are transported to the packaging section through an automated conveyor line. In the packaging process, advanced packaging equipment can quickly and accurately count, bag, or box the rice cakes, and at the same time, complete a series of packaging processes such as sealing and labeling. During the packaging process, the equipment is also equipped with functions such as weight detection and metal detection to ensure that each package of rice cakes leaving the factory meets strict weight and quality standards.
