Food & Beverage

Q: What precisely is critical cleaning? How does it differ from “regular” cleaning? A: It refers to a very specific type of cleaning. It is where the cleaning itself impacts the value of the finished output from whatever residue/contaminant is being cleaned.

Q. Which Alconox Inc. brand cleaner is well suited for cleaning pH and dissolved oxygen probes?

A. Dissolved oxygen and pH probes used in fermentation vessels can get buildup from the fermentation media that degrades the probe performance and increases the likelihood of batch to batch contamination. Even CIP systems cannot always reliably clean the port crevices and o-rings.

Q: We are looking for detergent and process recommendations for manual cleaning of a 100 gallon mixer. We make one product in the mixer which contains water, starch, acidic buffers, sucralose and preservative. Currently when cleaning, we boil for 1 hour at 90°C, then cool, drain and soak in cool water while using the mixing blades.  Scrub brushes and a spray hosing follows that. The mixer is made from stainless steel.

We currently use Alconox detergent to clean our cold-form extruders. While it’s great for grease, it doesn’t seem to help cut the stickiness we see from cane molasses and corn syrup. Do you have a recommendation for another cleaning agent?

We run our caustic cleaning at pH 10-10.5. However, the specifications say the nominal pH of a 1% Tergazyme solution is 9.5 Are we compromising cleaning proteins / enzyme performance by using the higher pH and running as part of a caustic cycle? Can we run it at 110F or should we be lower?