Bain marie's

[shaneb]

Hi Guys,

I'm thinking about buying a bain marie for myself as a belated birthday present. I've been looking at ones which can take a full GN1/1 x 150mm deep pan. And getting a couple of GN 1/2 x 150mm pans for smaller batches. I will control it externally with the controller box and RTD that I presently use with my electric hotplate and pots. Below is a link to the actual unit.

http://www.fischerequip.com.au/bain-marie-c44/bain-marie-8710-p197/

Does anyone see any issues with doing this? I was also thinking of getting some GN1/3 pans to keep wax in.

Thanks for your advice.

Shane

[H-K-J]

Hi shane
a lot of people are using this system, search the forum I am sure there is a lot on the subject

[shaneb]

Thanks. I feel like an idiot.  I googled the subject, but didn't think to search here.... Off I go to search.

Shane

[Kern]

My setup is an 8-inch full size steam table pan heated by an electric griddle.  A controller has a probe inserted directly into the milk filled vat.  I usually set the griddle to about 250F to heat the milk.  This setup does not create any hotspots that you could not put your hand on as the milk conducts heat very rapidly from the 20 gauge SS pan.  I've learned to turn the griddle down when the milk temperature is three degrees less than the set point.  With the above griddle setting six gallons of milk heat at a rate of about 0.7 degrees F per minute.   I can turn the griddle up to 400F and get a heating rate of about 1.0 F/min - still with no hot spots for the reasons stated above PLUS the fact that I have a 1/4 inch aluminum plate that sits between the griddle and vat to better distribute the griddle heat.  The plate is shimmed with folded aluminum foil to essentially take out the slight curve of the griddle (put there for grease draining). 

You are looking at a similar shaped vat with a water bath that will be electrically heated.  My guess is that the water bath capacity will be between 1 and 2 gallons.

Comparing the two systems I can see that a water bath will hold the milk temperature at a constant temperature better during renneting.  This is because there will be much more heat in the water than exists in my griddle when it is turned off during renneting.  I cover the vat with lots of cotton towels to hold the heat in but still drop about 2-3F over a 45 minute period.  However, I doubt that the water bath will be able to heat as fast as the griddle simply because you can't get the water hot enough to transfer heat fast enough into the milk without running the risk of hugely exceeding your target.  A lower capacity water bath will help in this regard simply because less heat will be held in the water.

The ideal water bath heater would allow both warm and cold water to circulate in the system:  Warm water during the initial heating and then less warm water as the temperature approached the goal temperature.  Finally, at goal it would circulate goal temperature water.  Large commercial systems work this way.  You'll have to make a few runs by heating water to learn your system and get it to work the way you want it to work.  Water and milk heat at about the same rate so it is easy to set up experiments and take the knowledge learned and apply it to making cheese.

[shaneb]

Thanks Kern. There are some excellent points there and food for thought. I had considered a pan on a griddle, but I do like the idea of the heat capacity of the water bath. I struggle with this at the moment with my big stock pot on my portable electric hotplate. It makes keeping curds warm while cheddaring difficult. I guess the answer is what I've looked at will work, so it is a matter of buying it and making it work for me.

Will provide an update when I have it. I was looking at the deeper pans, but it seems like most of the bain marie's I've found don't cater to pans that deep. It is a little frustrating. As it is, the 150mm pans are considered 'floaters', but should work with the pan full of milk.

Shane

[Kern]

I am becoming enamored with the idea of using a stainless steel stock pot (these go larger than 25 gallons) on a gas stove for super large batches.  I like gas better than electric simply because when you turn it off very little additional heat is put into the pot - no red hot burner to cool down.

[shaneb]

Having been working with natural gas controlled burners for quite I few years I can so the attraction. I do prefer to try and automate the heating of the milk though and to do that via gas is a big drama. The regulations required to do it would be enormous to cater for all the safety interlocks and type approvals. I think I'll pass on that.

Realistically I think the pan sizes for the bain marie would be more than big enough for my home needs. I ramp my milk to temperature over a couple of hours and the hotplate would never get red hot.

I'll now have to make a list of what parts I want to order. Does anyone keep wax in bain marie pans? I'm thinking of having some GN 1/3 x 150mm pans for that. I realise I'd need a lot of wax to stop them, but the shape would probably make applying the wax quite easy. Any thoughts?

Thanks.

Shane

[shaneb]

I received my bain marie today with 1x GN1/1 x mm pan + lid and 2x GN1/2 x 150mm pans + lid. I did a quick heat up with water and it worked quite nicely. I need to do some modifications to pans and lids to allow for easy and reliable installation of my temperature sensors. I had them wedged in today for the test, but I'm sure I can improve on that. I'll post some photos once it's done.

Shane

[Kern]

Shane, It would be very helpful if you could publish some data from any tests you do.  Three things I'd like to see are capacity of both the jacket and vat, full throttle temperature increase with water filled to capacity and some data on temperature over run when reaching the controller set point. 

Kern

[shaneb]

I'll see what I can put together Kern. It will probably be later in the week. I'm going to attempt a cheddar in it tomorrow.

Shane

[jmason]

And if you could run a quick fourier analysis it would really warm the cockles of Kern the engineer"s heart.

[shaneb]

Unfortunately the temperature controllers I've used don't have comms. I'll have to manually record data. I do have a datalogger I could use, but I'll have to see if I can get it running easily. I suspect I'll need to modify my comms drivers as the modules I have aren't the standard ones I normally used.

Shane