During processing, milk fat is removed partially or completely in order to:
- Obtain a fat-reduced or fat free
- Concentrate milk fat or the production of high fat products
- Standardize the fat content of milk
The decreaming process has significant economic importance, as it controls the efficiency of the fat separation.
The key objective is to manufacture a skim milk with the lowest possible fat content, which corresponds to good decreaming efficiency. Knowledge of the basics of the fat separation is important for an optimal decreaming process.
Decreaming is based on the facts that fat exists in polydisperse system in an emulsified state and that the specific density difference between milkfat and skim milk is fairly large.
Basically two processes for fat separation are possible, natural decreaming and separation with machine. Natural creaming has no industrial significance.
Decreaming Process
