"Seventeen years ago, the big rage among the hotels was who could serve the cheapest buffet in town, and price was the driving force when buying bakery products," Tony Sr. explains. "Since then, Las Vegas with its mega resorts has assembled some of the finest chefs from around the world. Their battle tactic is who can serve the finest buffet and provide the highest quality in their fine restaurants."
Las Vegas chefs no longer settle for only "supermarket bread and fast food buns," he adds. "They want products they can be proud of-sourdough rolls, European-style breads and so on. Our approach always has been to provide quality and service at reasonable prices, which will win out in the end."
Great Buns can accommodate the many required varieties largely because of the plant's automated production and computerized ordering system.
Roll line leads charge
The heart of production beats along Great Buns' high-speed roll line, which includes a 75- by 12-ft. direct-fired tunnel oven. Most of the bakery's 24 roll varieties are hearth baked. "It's part of our goal to make ordinary products appear extra ordinary," Augle explains. One example is the bakery's signature gourmet hamburger buns, available in plain, sesame, onion and whole wheat.
Production begins with drawing 12.5% protein bread flour from a 75,000-lb. capacity silo, which has three scaling hoppers. Flour, combined with water, salt, yeast and other small ingredients are mixed into a straight dough in one of two 500-lb. dough horizontal mixers. Both units have direct expansion refrigeration to help handle Las Vegas' searing summer heat.
The dough mixes for about 13 minutes and receives 10 to 12 minutes' floor time. A trough hoist dumps the dough into a six-pocket divider at a high-speed makeup line, which can process as many as 1,500 dozen pieces per hour.
The divider scales the dough into 2- to 4.5-oz. pieces, which travel eight to ten minutes through an intermediate proofer. After being sheeted, they enter a panless proofer. Seeded varieties first pass under an adjustable seeding unit, developed by Tony Sr. The seeder densely coats the tops as if they were hand dipped. It features a relay control, which automatically adjusts conveyor speed to provide desired seed coverage.
Buns travel through the proofer about one hour at 115'F dry bulb/85'F wet bulb and 80% humidity. Proofed buns are dispersed onto a 12-ft.-wide conveyor and fed into the scoring machine, which cuts the pieces twice at right angles.
Tapped supplier's expertise
The machine is another example of Great Buns' goal to offer distinctive products. "We wanted to go beyond making traditional soft, plain dinner rolls and produce European-style product," Tony Jr. says. Bakers for several years scored product by hand, but as volume grew, "we reached our limits in what we could handle by hand."
Great Buns worked with the manufacturer of an automatic scoring system to replicate the appearance of European product and eliminate labor-intensive hand scoring. The firm, Tony Sr. notes, not only custom-engineered the unit to fill Great Buns' needs but also ensured that the computer coordinated its production rates with those of the proofer and oven. "The manufacturer was really challenged to make the system connect with the proofer and oven, but the company stayed with it until everything was on target," he says.
The machine features two scoring units, which can make from one to four uniform cuts. The first unit makes 90' cross cuts; the second can be adjusted to cut from 180' to 45' for different designs.
The machine features two scoring units, which can make from one to four uniform cuts. The first unit makes 90' cross cuts; the second can be adjusted to cut from 180' to 45' for different designs. During each 50-second dwell period, the machine can score 17 1/2 dozen pieces. "How many bakeries can produce dinner rolls with four cuts in high volume?" Tony Jr. asks. "This gives us a distinctive advantage over our competitors."
Scored buns move though the tunnel oven, where they are steamed in the first chamber and receive a total 12- to 15-minute bake. Upon exiting the oven, product travels on a linear conveyor about five minutes.
The linear conveyor originally was designed to run a straight course back past the oven, scoring station and proofer and connect with a spiral cooler. However, a miscalculation in locating the proofer created an awkward angle to overcome. Tony Sr. notes that the conveyor company worked with Great Buns to make the bend as smooth as possible, thus reducing potential mechanical problems.
