Design and Characterization of a Gas-Powered Baking Oven Fabricated with Local Engineering Materials

Abstract:

Statistically, there is a high dependence on snacks in Nigeria for everyday food. This has made the production of snacks a lucrative venture in Nigeria thereby putting enormous pressure on the technological innovation of snacks production. A baking oven which is a thermally insulated cavity is the most widely used appliance in the food service industry, snacks inclusive. However, most ovens used in Nigeria for snacks production at the small/cottage industrial level are usually limited in one way or the other, hence this work. In this work, an oven with a capacity to bake 100 loaves of bread each weighing 200g was designed. The oven has a dual heating source with a top and down heating grills that is powered using a domestic cooking gas. Its dimensions are (1800 x 600 x 600) mm for height, length and width. The oven had a see-through window and a heat sensor to monitor the progress of the food being baked and the temperature respectively, without necessarily opening the door during operation. The oven had the heating capacity of 19.4 KW and cooking energy efficiency (CEE) of 70.79%. The organoleptic properties of the breads baked in the oven showed that a bread with high sensory attributes can be baked with the developed oven as there was no significant difference between the bread baked with the oven and the control of similar recipe baked in a conventional oven. The oven was therefore found suitable and convenient for baking cookies at the level of small/cottage industries.