FFCE is among the top food and beverage consulting firms for the production of powdered milk products. These products would meet a broad range of customer needs. Converting liquid milk into a power that remains shelf stable while maintaining its nutritional profile and taste, is not an easy task. FFCE ensures that your powdered milk meets the highest quality to ensure that it meets the consumer’s taste.

Our Technological Support mainly targets these crucial stages such as evaporation and spray drying that are central to turning milk into a fine, and homogenous powder. We assist you in optimizing these processes to get the right flow, acceptable texture and good sensorial qualities of the final powder product. Milk Production Improvement Our Process Improvement services makes your production more efficient from milk treatment to packing of the product. 

Our Regulatory Compliance & Documentation services are aimed to enable you to meet all the safety and quality regulatory aspects related to production of powdered milk. We guarantee that your product conforms to all the right standards most especially in matters to do with moisture content and microbial growth. It also helps you enter joint ventures for expansion or in case you do not want to invest in fixed plant too. 

What is the Powdered Milk Processing?

Making powdered milk requires a slow elimination of water from the liquid milk in order to get a final product with little moisture, thus easy to store and with a long shelf life. It is beginning with pasteurisation in which the milk is normally subjected to heat in a bid to eliminate dangerous bacterial organisms. That is then followed by milk concentration through evaporation, during which most of the water in milk is removed.

The following process is spray drying; in this process the concentrated milk is sprayed in a chamber full of hot air. The water evaporates fast and what remains are fine particles of milk powder. This powder is collected and is sometimes milled further so as to allow the powder to dissolve when it is mixed with water. Last, they pack the powder into airtight bags to avoid any form of moisture that may contaminate the milk powder Along the process, temperature and humidity must be well regulated to ensure that the powder does not lose it nutritional value, or worsen the solubility.

Production Process

Milk Concentration

  • Process: Fresh milk is evaporated, or concentrated, in order to make some of its volume shrink and thus its amount of solid matter grow.
  • Equipment: Evaporator
  • Temperature: 50-70°C (122-158°F)
  • Objective: For example, in order to peel off a large number of water content before the drying stage to reduce the energy in the drying stage.
  • Spray Drying
  • Process: The sugar fed directly on the concentrated milk then atomized and sprayed in hot air chamber and the water content in it evaporizes almost immediately.
  • Equipment: Spray Dryer
  • Atomization: Coating by impingement method using large droplet sizes with the aid of rotary or nozzle type atomizers.
  • Temperature: Inlet air temperature: 150-200°C; Outlet air temperature: 70-90°C.
  • Objective: To increase flow property and solubility of the final product and its shelf life as well.

Freeze Drying

  • Process: Food is frozen, after that it is placed under high vacuum, ice gets converted directly into the vapor phase without turning into the liquid phase.
  • Equipment: Freeze Dryer
  • Temperature: During freezing process, ranged below -40°C (-40 F); during sublimation process, it ranged and increase slowly.
  • Objective: To maintain most of the nutrient and organoleptic characteristics of fresh pasteurized milk as well as achieve a fine, free-flowing texture in powdered milk.
  • Cooling and Packaging
  • Process: The dried milk powder is cooled and sealed in sterility clear plastic bags or any other hermetic containers.
  • Equipment: Laтона and Refrigeraon Equipment as well as Packaging Machines
  • Temperature: Powder is cooled to room temperature (about 25 0C or 77 0F)
  • Objective: To control the amount of moisture and freshness levels to ensure product quality is maintained by reducing the effects of moisture and to containing contamination.
  • Powdered milk is produced through drying fresh milk, packing, storing and transport it in various outlets.

Milk Concentration: Evaporator, 50-70°C

  • Spray Drying: Spray Dryer, 150 – 200°C (inlet temperature), 70 – 90°C (outlet temperature).
  • Drum Drying: Drum Dryer, 120-150°C
  • Freeze Drying: Freeze Dryer, below -40°C
  • Cooling and Packaging: Ambient temperature in hermetically sealed, clean and moisture-free containers