Industrial baking for savory products: meeting the challenges of quality, flexibility, and performance

11/19/2025

In the food industry, baking is much more than a step in the production process. It shapes the flavor, texture, appearance, and shelf life. For small and delicate savory products, manufacturers must uphold the highest quality standards through precise cooking methods.

Maintaining control across a wide range of recipes, formats, and substrates while optimizing for efficiency is key. In a sector that sees constant innovation and growing product customization, flexibility is critical. Equipment needs to be able to adapt quickly to recipe changes and new substrates without compromising quality or productivity.

The answer to these challenges comes down to versatile equipment that delivers precise, flexible control at every stage of the cooking process.

Precision in baking: a major industrial challenge

One of the reasons producing small savory items at an industrial scale requires this level of precision is that it’s necessary to maintain their organoleptic properties. Certain products, such as mini gratins, make this step even more intricate. Any inclusions must be fully cooked through, while the egg-based binder coagulates evenly without becoming too dry. Puff pastries add another layer of complexity. Their baking method must allow the dough to rise, while keeping the filling tender and delivering a crisp, golden crust with a contrasting color.

Thanks to its modular design and compact heating zones (less than 25 m²), which operate independently, the M-DAN oven offers a precise baking curve. Each zone can combine three heat transfer modes (convection and/or radiation), with a precise intensity adjustment of the heating intensity and hygrometry. Energy input between the top and bottom of the product is also managed independently.
This precise energy management allows industrial food manufacturers to achieve the desired organoleptic characteristics, even for the most delicate products.

Flexibility and consistency: adapting to every recipe

Achieving consistency is essential in industrial production, and even more critical in ovens, which are typically designated as CCPs (Critical Control Points) on the production line. It is necessary to guarantee uniform cooking across all products, regardless of their position in the oven, to ensure each one reaches the required pasteurization value.
The key lies in airflow control. “Having uniform hot air circulation across the oven’s zones is crucial to achieve consistent products,” says Marie Laisne, Marketing Manager at MECATHERM.

To meet the growing diversity of consumer expectations, manufacturers face another challenge: delivering the expected product quality across a wide range of recipes. This diversity requires flexible equipment that can quickly adapt to any innovation or new substrate while reducing recipe changeover times.

The M-DAN oven is particularly well-suited to meet these challenges. It offers the flexibility needed to support product innovation, and its technology stands out for its high thermal responsiveness. The M-DAN oven can increase by +100 °C in 20 minutes and decrease by -100 °C in 30 minutes. This performance significantly reduces changeover times, optimizes throughput, and ensures uniform cooking tailored to each recipe.

By combining precision and flexibility, the M-DAN oven gives manufacturers the power to tackle today’s challenges and stay ahead of tomorrow’s growing demand for product diversity and quality.