Consumers have a strong appreciation for "traditional foods" and "traditional handicrafts." Handmade noodles have a history of over 1500 years in my country, and their production involves traditional techniques passed down through generations, requiring meticulous skill and precision in every step of the process. The traditional handmade process for hollow noodles involves more than 20 steps, making it a complex and demanding craft. Currently, it is mostly produced in small workshops or through semi-mechanized processes, resulting in low efficiency and a relatively low rate of high-quality finished products.
Haikejia's fully automated hand-pulled noodle production line is an innovative product developed and manufactured in-house. The entire production process replicates traditional handmade noodle-making techniques, including kneading and proofing the dough, gradually flattening and stretching it, cutting and shaping the noodles, stretching them further, and finally drying and cutting them. This process ensures the production of high-quality noodles, meeting food safety standards and supporting enterprises in upgrading to produce premium products. With a capacity of 10-20 tons per day, it is currently the largest-capacity hand-pulled noodle production line available.
For its high-hydration, soft and elastic noodle production line, Haikejia has also made breakthroughs in equipment innovation. It utilizes high-hydration vacuum kneading technology to ensure a uniform gluten network and thorough hydration of the dough. The rolling equipment uses high-quality materials and a special process to prevent noodles from sticking together; a unique noodle-separating process further enhances the ease of handling. This technology produces noodles that are softer, more elastic, and have a more delicate texture.
With the advent of the new era of food service, fresh and frozen noodles are experiencing strong growth. To help businesses produce superior quality fresh noodles, Haikejia has innovatively developed an "intelligent fresh noodle production line," pioneering a "layered-composite rolling" noodle-making process—a significant breakthrough in fresh noodle processing technology. We have already obtained domestic and international patent protection for this technology. This layered-composite rolling process, based on traditional noodle sheet layering, involves three uniform layers of noodle dough (in a 1:1:2 ratio) on the inner side of the noodle sheet, creating a dense structure with a loose inner layer and a tight outer layer. Haikejia, in collaboration with a doctoral team from Jiangnan University, conducted data analysis on the quality characteristics of these noodles, comparing them with those produced using traditional methods. The results showed that the new process outperformed traditional methods in terms of cooking quality, texture, chewiness, and sensory evaluation. Furthermore, noodles produced using this layered-composite process are softer on the inside and firmer on the outside, cook faster, and have optimal chewiness, tensile strength, and elongation, resulting in noodles that are chewy, soft, and smooth, with enhanced resistance to sogginess.
Furthermore, the development of whole-grain noodles is another area of research for noodle manufacturers. To address the challenges of producing low-GI noodles, a low-temperature vacuum extrusion process has been developed. This technology maintains a vacuum environment throughout the extrusion process, ensuring that the noodle temperature remains below 50°C. The resulting noodles have a unique texture and nutritional value, characterized by their chewy and elastic consistency.
