Fresh ideas to the ice cream industry

MooBella created a new approach to ice cream making, one that produces a single scoop of fresh ice cream—in any one of 96 combinations of flavors—in under one minute (conventional ice cream can take 3-6 months to get to a store!). Inside the MooBella machine, an all natural ice cream mix is pumped using Watson-Marlow 314D pumps from an aseptic disposable bag and transferred to a mixing chamber where it is aerated and injected with flavor. The ice cream then undergoes a thin-film flash freezing process, after which it is formed into a scoop and dispensed into a single serve cup. The entire process takes 45 seconds.

Integral to the machine, the 314D smoothly and efficiently transport the ice cream mixture through the process. According to Moobella’s VP Jim Baxter, the peristaltic pumps carry distinct advantages over other technologies. “Early in the process of developing the machine, we decided that ease of use, particularly disassembly for replacement would be critical,” said Baxter. “We considered the use of other types of positive displacement pumps, but they were difficult to disassemble. So we quickly decided upon peristaltic technology.” They looked at other brands besides Watson-Marlow, but each presented serious problems. “They were just not operator-friendly,” said Baxter. “Some wouldn’t even fit into the area that we had designated for them inside the machinery. Just replacing their tubing was tough; it was an operation that could be easily messed up.”

Conversely, Watson-Marlow’s 314 pumps are compact and easy to load. It has a unique mechanism that lifts the track away from the rotor to give easy access to insert the tubing and consistent loading. The ice cream mix is aseptically packaged in a disposable bag-in-box pouch which is and discarded when empty, so no cleaning is required. “Once you get the tubing system honed for your specific viscosity and temperature of operation, the pumps perform flawlessly,” Baxter said. “Even though they are often severely treated by the operators, they are more than able to withstand the pounding.” The way things look; peristaltic pumps are going to be an integral element in this revolutionary fresh ice cream making process. For ice cream lovers, MooBella and Watson-Marlow, that’s a pretty sweet deal.

Find out about the Watson-Marlow OEM pumps range.