For millers and bakers, the baking test has long been the final word on flour quality and dough performance. But a passed test doesn't always explain itself and a failed one even less so. Without objective data from the process that preceded it, operators are left to speculate about what mixing behaviour, proofing conditions, or raw material variability may have contributed to an outcome.

KPM Analytics has responded to this problem with the opening of a new baking lab within its Rheology Centre of Excellence in Villeneuve-la-Garenne, France. The facility, housed at KPM Analytics France headquarters, is designed to run traditional baking tests alongside instrumental analysis, so that the two can be directly correlated.

The lab

The physical setup mirrors a working bakery environment: industrial mixers, a proofing chamber and a commercial oven sit alongside a suite of analytical instruments. These include rheological tools, Mixolab, Alveolab, Rheo F4 and SDmatic 2, as well as near-infrared compositional analysis via the SpectraStar XT and finished-product vision measurement using TheiaVu systems.

Between them, these instruments can characterise flour for damaged starch, protein, ash and moisture content; track dough behaviour through mixing and proofing; and evaluate finished loaves or rolls for size, shape, colour and crumb structure. The stated goal is to give customers a path from "final product to flour", working backwards from what they see in the baked result to what the pre-process data could have predicted or explained.

Connecting the dots between data and decisions

The lab's approach challenges a limitation that practitioners know well: that a baking test reveals outcome, not cause. As Lionel Bernard, General Manager of KPM Analytics France, puts it: "The baking test has always been a valuable tool, but it does not always tell the complete story."

The practical implications are meaningful. Pre-screening raw materials instrumentally before committing to a full bake test could reduce the time, energy and ingredient quantities currently absorbed by exploratory trials. Where a test does go wrong, having parallel rheological and compositional data gives a starting point for investigation rather than guesswork. Adjustments to enzyme use, additive dosing, or proofing time can then be made with reference to measured parameters rather than intuition alone.

Training alongside testing

The facility is also intended to function as a customer training environment. Rather than learning individual instruments in isolation, visitors can work through how measurements from rheology, NIR composition analysis and vision inspection contribute together to a quality control decision. KPM's applications team will be on hand to guide that process. The idea being that customers leave with a clearer picture of how their instruments fit into the broader production context.

Funding and partnership

The baking lab was made possible through investment from the Synar Group and its subsidiary Euro Food Product Company, a Kazakhstan-based distributor of KPM rheological instruments. Rustam Mamirov of Synar described the investment as a statement of shared direction rather than a simple equipment purchase: the two organisations' alignment around cereal and flour analysis underpins the collaboration.

KPM Analytics says customer visits to the new facility will begin in the coming months. Further information is available at kpmanalytics.com.