Bun-making equipment: choosing the right tools for the job

Traditional sweet buns, a roll call that includes Chelsea buns, iced buns, cream buns and doughnuts, have always been solid sellers in the bakery.

But in the last few years, Nordic-influenced cinnamon buns, brioche buns and new takes on old favourites, such as flavoured hot cross buns, have freshened up the roster.

Buns have been off the scene a little of late, as during and after the coronavirus lockdown many bakeries had to streamline their product range and reduce SKUs for speed and efficiency.

As things get back to a more normal sort of abnormal, a wider range of sweet buns is back on the menu, for example Greggs announced in September that it was bringing back Belgian buns to its shops.

So as buns return to the stage, it’s worth having a look and reviewing equipment and processes to see how to achieve the best returns in these more challenging times.

It is a fact that buns can sometimes be a little more complicated, sticky and labour-intensive to produce than some other bakery products. But no bun is too tricky or specialist to make by machine, although cost and scale may be issues, equipment suppliers agree.

“In principle, any handicraft process can be industrialised. The only issue is that sometimes the cost cannot be justified for the volume of production required.”

In fact, automation of processes is the key to success in reducing overheads in the bakery and creating consistent products, reducing labour costs and even extending your range, they argue.

“For any form of ‘modern bun’ there is a suitable solution, especially in the industrial sector. If solutions are not yet available, they can in most cases be developed to fit the problem, or if existing, individually adapted to suit the bakery’s take on the product,” comments Richard Tearle, general manager at Rondo.

“In principle, any handicraft process can be industrialised. The only issue is that sometimes the cost of the solution cannot be justified for the volume of production required.”

As there is almost always a way to get around any dough-handling issues on buns, he says, the degree of automation required is the question. It is a point that Stewart Morris, sales director at Koenig supplier EPP, also makes. Fruited buns, brioche rolls, burger buns – in fact, any enriched doughs – can be produced at scale in an efficient and consistent manner, he says, given the appropriate choice of technology, such as mixers, dividers and ovens.

“Prudent investment in the right quality equipment such as mixers, dividers and ovens can make a huge difference to a bakery. By using machines, you get that repeatability that is required. This also reduces the reliance on skilled workers and addresses the ongoing challenge of recruiting skilled bakers.”

Range of solutions

Mono Equipment, which works in partnership with Italy-based Canol, can also offer a range of solutions designed to produce a wide range of bun doughs by replicating time-consuming hand movements with manual labour, says Chris Huish, director of independent sales.

The pastry lines comprise a range of features such as stress-free extruder, cross pinner and satellite head that work in conjunction with each other to avoid any stress or undue tension on the dough.

These stress-free artisan sheeting and laminating industrial pastry lines can be used to produce on-trend cinnamon and Danish buns as well as swirls, Huish says.

The latest trends in bun-style pastries are in fact ideal for upscaling production, and an easy win, as the equipment involved is easy to implement, versatile and offers flexibility across other ranges of products, comments Ann Wells, commercial director at Brook Food, UK distributor for the Italian manufacturer Polin.

Automated bun lines offer the prospect of added versatility, allowing many other products to be manufactured on the same machine. Polin Baker’s Table pastry lines can produce around 250 buns per minute dependent on the product specification, says Wells.

Product can be filled, rolled and guillotined as buns such as cinnamon buns are prepared for proving and baking. With the same or additional tooling, products such as croissants, sausage rolls and pizza bases can be created, she says.

Even for a smaller-scale bakery, automation will help to deliver efficiency, consistency and quality. When making a choice, cleanability of the machinery is a key factor to consider in order to maintain efficiency of changeover and prevent cross-contamination, Morris at EPP notes.

Building up gradually

The move to automation does not need to be ‘all or nothing’ for the smaller baker. Craft bakers could gradually build up their production with the Rondo Ecoline or Polyline make-up table that is fed by sheeters such as Rondostar 5000, suggests Tearle.

If, in time, production output outgrows this process, larger, faster sheeters could be added and a larger, faster make-up table such as the Rondo Starline may be appropriate.

When full automation is required, upgrading to a dough band feeding line such as the Smartline would be the next move. And when necessary, a bespoke solution can be developed. At the beginning of the year Rondo installed an industrial Mini Cinnamon Swirl line in California.

In this case, regular panning with a normal panning system was not possible due to the stickiness of the dough. In smaller production, the swirls would be placed in the pans by hand. Rondo had to get the 30g swirls into the pans in such a way that the cut surface was flat, and the windings were visible after baking.

It developed a horizontal guillotine with a pan feeding system underneath. The dough strands are wound with the six-row roll-wind accessory and deflected from the horizontal almost into the vertical, then fed to the guillotine. The guillotine cuts all six rows simultaneously directly above the pans fed beneath.

With bakery equipment suppliers lining up with inventive and stress-free dough solutions for buns, all that is left to do is choose the appropriate piece of kit.