freezer temperature must remain between -O°F to -10'F. Should the freezer exceed 10'F, an ADT system reacts as if the crisis were a break-in, alerting plant personnel any time of day or night. Refrigeration storage limit is 40'F to maintain the critical yeast cell life. Fleishmann's Yeast 50-lb cases are stored in the yeast cooling room at 3 6'F to 3 8'F. The central ammonia refrigeration system installed by Preston Refrigeration keeps flour temperatures at required levels during storage in order to achieve optimum mixing temperature.

100% PERFORMANCE. The heart of the current I-frozen dough operation is the dividing line. "Everything in this plant is designed based on the speed of this divider," Mr. Tepsic said. The line takes about I I minutes to process the dough.
Manufactured by Adamatic, the divider portions dough with the aid of an electronic eye. As dough is received into the hopper, a signal commands the slide below to open up and cut off 30-lb pieces for an even dough feed.
On the day of Baking &Snack's visit, the line was running white loaves at a rate of 13 0 per minute. The plant averages output of 50,000 to 60,000 frozen loaves a shift.
Dough balls drop into cups prior to their three- to five-minute travel time through the intermediate proofer. The proofer is kept at ambient temperature and humidity to provide time for the round dough balls to relax.
The dough balls pass through the chutes into a series of three rollers to begin the forming operation. Between the second and third rollers, the dough becomes disc-shaped, much like a 1/4-in.thick tortilla round. These dough discs are then rolled through the curling chains to a forming operation.
Dough is pressed slightly under the first series of boards. The second set of boards apply more pressure to lengthen each piece. Another chain orients products, and a final rolling operation straightens them all out.
Two top/bottom belts rotate product pieces one revolution; the bottom belt runs slightly slower than the top. Even the most slightly misshapen product is manually inspected and thrown away.

BAKE LIKE THE BEST. In the QA lab, Custom Foods test bakes all products using the same equipment and accessories used by its customer. "We want to replicate product exactly to their specifications," Mr. Tepsic said.
Each batch is quality controlled. Four samples are pulled from the end of each batch. Two of them are separated into a cue to be thawed that evening and baked off the next day. The other two go into storage until the product's freezer life is over. At the end of their freezer life, those samples are baked off just to ensure that everything remained stable. If a customer calls long distance with a problem, all they need to provide Custom Foods with is the product code on the carton.
"We're using the same machinery, the same equipment, the same ovens, the same knives, the same everything that they're using in San Diego or Minneapolis to make that product work, so our objective is to duplicate the product," Mr. Tepsic explained.

INGREDIENTS FOR SUCCESS. "Most large frozen dough manufacturers are really based on developing standard products to sell to a variety of customers, but not as focused on developing a unique product for a unique customer," Mr. Tepsic said. "We've already developed several new products to demonstrate our capabilities, but our primary focus is to develop signature products for large restaurant or in-store bakery chains that want to offer their customers a product that cannot be purchased anywhere else."
That Custom Foods remains a lean operation is also a strength. "There is not a lot of overhead," he said. "What I'm relying on with this company is that no one will provide a private branded product with the high level of quality at the same price that we're able to provide.
"You never really know all the ingredients required for success, but the more learning, knowledge and experience you gain, the more you can identify factors that lead to failure and avoid them."