We have a long history with manufacturing extruders to process food, pet food and treats
Bonnot Food Forming Extruders are single-screw machines designed for the ambient or chilled shaping of raw, pre-cooked, or partially processed food and pet food masses into precise geometries - sticks, rods, pillows, nugget pre-forms, and custom profiles - without the cooking function of the CO series. The FF series scales from laboratory and small-batch development quantities on the FF 1 through to high-volume continuous production on the FF 8, covering a wide range of throughput requirements. All contact surfaces are constructed in food-grade stainless steel meeting USDA and FDA requirements, and the jacketed barrel provides independent heating or cooling of each zone to manage the texture and forming behaviour of the material in process.
The FF series addresses the application where the product has already been cooked, blended, or otherwise processed upstream and requires only forming - whole-muscle meat chunks for wet pet food, pre-cooked surimi sticks, snack dough pre-forms before frying, and plant-based protein blanks before secondary processing. This positioning makes the FF series complementary to the CO cooking extruder: in a two-stage cooking and forming line, the CO handles the thermomechanical processing and the FF handles the precision forming, each operating at its process optimum. In a single-stage application, the FF handles materials that arrive at the extruder already in their final composition and require only shaping.
The FF series accepts any pre-conditioned food mass - raw, cooked, frozen-then-thawed, emulsified, or blended - and forms it to precise geometry without introducing the thermal treatment of a cooking extruder, preserving the thermal history of the upstream process. This process neutrality is the primary reason the FF series is specified for structured food products where the texture of the finished piece depends on maintaining the microstructure created upstream - whole-muscle fibres in pet food, fibrous protein strands in meat analogues, and particulate inclusions in specialty snack formats are all preserved by a forming-only extruder in ways they would not be if the material were re-cooked during forming.
The jacketed barrel provides both heating and cooling capability in the same machine. Heating maintains plasticity in stiff, cold-process masses that have insufficient mobility to fill the die without heat addition; cooling firms soft, warm masses before die exit to achieve the product temperature at which the material has sufficient structural integrity to hold a defined shape. For high-fat pet food masses that arrive at ambient temperature from a mixing step, the cooling function ensures consistent piece geometry by firming the fat-continuous matrix before it contacts the die - a processing condition that is directly responsible for the dimensional consistency of the finished piece.
Variable-speed drive control over screw speed gives the operator direct control over the shear rate applied to the material in the screw channel, which in structured food products determines texture. Lower screw speeds produce larger, more distinct structural elements - chunk-like textures in formed pet food, visible grain in plant-based products - while higher speeds produce smoother, more homogeneous textures suited to emulsified products and paste-based formats. This texture management capability through speed control allows a single FF extruder to produce different texture variants of the same product by changing screw speed rather than retooling.
Whole-Muscle and Chunk Pet Food
Chunk-style wet and semi-moist pet food products requiring realistic meat-like geometry and texture are formed using the FF series from blended meat, protein, and gravy matrices. The FF extruder's ability to operate at low screw speeds - preserving the coarse, chunky texture that premium pet food brands differentiate on - while maintaining consistent piece geometry is the primary basis for its specification in this application.
Cultivated Meat and Alternative Protein Forming
The FF series is used for forming cultivated meat and structured alternative protein products - applications at the frontier of food technology where extrusion of delicate cell-cultured or fibrous protein material requires the gentle, precise forming that a variable-speed extruder with temperature control provides. The low-shear forming capability of the FF series, operating at the cooler temperatures that cell-cultured material requires, is specifically what makes it appropriate for this application rather than a standard cooking extruder.
Processed Poultry, Meat, and Formed Protein Products
Nugget pre-forms, formed loaf products, and restructured meat blocks from poultry and meat processors require precise weight and geometry per piece to meet downstream portion control tolerances and reduce waste at the cutting and packaging stage. The FF extruder's consistent volumetric output per screw revolution is the mechanical basis for piece-weight consistency, with the die geometry determining the cross-sectional shape and the cutting system controlling piece length.
Surimi and Seafood Analogue Manufacturing
Pollock and other fish protein paste is formed into crab stick, shrimp analogue, and seafood stick geometries using the FF extruder, with die geometry controlling strand count, diameter, and cross-section detail. The temperature sensitivity of fish protein paste - which changes texture rapidly with even small temperature increases - makes the FF series' precision temperature control and variable-speed drive directly relevant to the production of surimi products with consistent texture and appearance.
Snack Dough Pre-forms and Pellets
Raw snack dough is extruded into pellets, discs, or rods before frying, baking, or puffing. Consistent piece weight from the extruder directly controls final product weight, texture, and oil uptake in the finishing step - properties that are specified in product design and must be maintained within narrow tolerances throughout the production run to meet label weight requirements and sensory quality standards.
Plant-Based Protein Products and Meat Analogues
Formed plant-based burger, nugget, and strip pre-forms from pea, soy, wheat gluten, and blended protein systems require the FF extruder's gentle shear at low temperatures to preserve the fibrous microstructure created in the upstream texturisation step. Plant-based meat analogues that have been textured in a high-moisture cooking extruder to create anisotropic fibre orientation would lose that texture if re-extruded through a forming stage that applies high shear or elevated temperatures.
+ Jacketed barrel(s) for temperature processing control
+ Various screw geometries available
+ The length-to-diameter {L/D} ratio can be changed to optimize the process
+ Hollow screw with rotary union for temperature control available on sizes 4" and above
+ Many die options available including multi-hole, single orifice and co-extrusion
Our FF 4 Series processing a pet food combined with our RC 4 Series.
Here is a sample of some pet food.
The Bonnot Company is pleased to offer FREE feasibility testing in our test facility. Come and take advantage of our comprehensive catalog of test equipment; different extruder designs, screw geometries, forming dies, temperature control options, mixers and material testing equipment.
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