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OwnerWilly Mertens, Paul Otten +1inventors
InventorsWilly Mertens, Paul Otten, Frieda Sporen
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The invention provides cereal snack foods comprising a body of expanded and bonded cereal grains, wherein the cereal grains have been flattened by rolling prior to expansion. The cereal grains may be rice grains. The invention also provides a process for the production of such snack foods, the process comprising the steps of: providing a plurality of cereal grains having a moisture content sufficiently high to render the grains plastic; compressing the cereal grains to flatten the grains; where necessary drying and/or rehydrating the flattened cereal grains to a moisture content of from about 10% by weight to about 20% by weight; introducing the dried cereal grains into a mold; and applying heat and pressure to puff and bond the dried cereal grains in the mold to form the body.
A cereal snack comprising a body of expanded and bonded cereal grains, wherein the cereal grains have been flattened by rolling prior to expansion.
A cereal snack according to any preceding claim, wherein the body of the snack is in the form of a chip having a mean diameter of from about 20 mm to about 45 mm and a mean thickness of from about 1 mm to about 8 mm.
A cereal snack according to any preceding claim, wherein the body of the snack is substantially round, oval or polygonal.
A cereal snack according to any preceding claim, wherein the body of the snack has substantially flat and parallel upper and lower surfaces.
A cereal snack according to any preceding claim, wherein said body of the snack has a volume as determined by a particle displacement method of from about 1 cm3to about 10 cm3.
A cereal snack according to any preceding claim, wherein said body of the snack has a weight per unit area of from about 0.03g/cm2 to about 1 g/cm2.
A cereal snack according to any preceding claim, wherein said body of the snack has an equilibrium moisture uptake after 60 minutes at 30° C. and 90% relative humidity of at least 10% by weight based on the weight of the dry snack body.
A cereal snack according to any preceding claim, wherein the said body of the snack consists essentially of said expanded and bonded cereal grains.
A cereal snack according to any preceding claim, wherein the cereal grains consist essentially of whole or broken rice grains.
A cereal snack according to any preceding claim, wherein the snack comprises less than 20% by weight of fat.
A cereal snack according to any preceding claim, wherein an additional food ingredient has been infused into the cereal grains prior to expansion.
A process for the preparation of a cereal snack comprising a body of expanded and bonded cereal grains, said process comprising the steps of:
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.