Once again, Team USA captured the gold at the World Cup of Baking in Paris, where exhibitors displayed a variety of systems and ingredients for producing premium products on an industrial scale.

With a sculpture of flour and sugar that featured Mount Rushmore and the Statue of Liberty, the baking team from the United States captured top honors at the Coupe du Monde de la Boulangerie at Europain 2005 in Paris.

As the speakers blasted “We are the Champions” by Queen, Team USA members Jeffrey Yankello, Jory Downer and captain William Leaman hoisted the trophy high, proving that they were indeed the champions of the world when it comes to baking.

For the Americans, it was the third time in six years that they won the competition. They did so in 1999, but were edged out by the Japanese in 2002.

This year, the French, who were considered odds-on favorites by the partisan crowd, were one of the bridesmaids yet again, finishing in second place while the Japanese took third. In 2002, France came in fourth.

In some ways, this year’s Europain was slightly different from previous shows from an exhibitors’ perspective. On one hand, there were a greater number of international companies, such as Rademaker, Fritsch, Werner & Pfleiderer and Rheon, catering to the wholesale baker with industrial-sized equipment. In fact, 35% of attendees came from major wholesale baking or large retail chains. There also were a good number of U.S. and Canadian bakers walking the show.

However, Europain continues to be a more European, and even French, event — unlike other international bakery trade shows, such as iba 2006 in Germany and the International Baking Industry Exposition, which will be held in Orlando in 2007. In all, there were 670 exhibitors from 25 nations, but only a handful of them were from the United States.

At the same time, being a mostly European show isn’t a bad thing. Certainly, the champagne was flowing quite readily at many of the booths. Moreover, the Demarle booth featured a Parisian-style fashion show where models pranced across the stage to popular music wearing bleached-blonde wigs and funky outfits made of flexible baking pans. No, we kid you not. It was something you had to see to believe.

On a more serious note, many exhibitors featured innovative systems that showed bakers how to automate difficult-to-handle, Old World baked goods that had previously been produced only by hand. Others featured flexible technology designed to produce a wide variety of products.

Rademaker, for instance, highlighted its new Multibake line of modular ovens, which provide an optimum price/quality ratio. The company’s Multibake “d” is a directly heated oven with modulating burners and the Multibake “i” is an impingement or indirectly heated oven. The company also offers the Multibake “r” or radiant oven using the cyclotherm principle. Finally, the Multibake “h” is a hybrid, which provides multiple types of heating options grouped in a single unit. (www.rademaker.com)

Konig Machines rolled out the Artisan SFB line, which can handle doughs with up to 80% hydration that may need multiple hours of fermentation before they are produced. The system can produce 2,600 lbs. of dough per hour. Using gravity that doesn’t destroy the cell structure, the system creates a continuous dough string and features a unique bowl rounder that gently forms the product. (www.rollequip.com)

Mecatherm introduced its FTM tunnel oven that can bake products in half the usual time and retain more water to extend shelf life. The system has a hotter convection heat on the bottom and a cooler radiant heat from the top. The different temperatures allow the baker to create a thicker base for the par-baked breads to minimize collapsing while allowing for a thinner crust on the top with little browning. The modular oven ranges from 40 to 120 sq. meters and can be used to make fully baked frozen bread or sandwich breads as well. (www.mecatherm.fr)

Fritsch featured its MULTILINE system that can produce everything from ciabatta and focaccia to artisan breads and baguettes with a variety of cell structures. The flexible line features gentle dough processing, allowing it to process products with high water absorption rates and long proofing times. The continuous sheeter also can process Danish and pastry dough.

Jim Bruce, national sales manager for Fritsch USA, noted that he saw increased demand for croissant machines at Europain. Many croissant producers had purchased their first systems 10 or 15 years ago and were looking for new technology that further automated the process with higher product quality.

“Bakers here also want high capacity, and they want nobody to be working the line,” Bruce explained. (www.Fritsch-Forum.com)

Capway Systems highlighted a number of conveying equipment, including its ROBOCAP robotic pick-and-place pan operation. The system can gently stack and unstack an oven’s length worth of pans at one time. (www.capwayusa.com)

Sharing the booth with Capway was PCData, which featured Distrib Production Manager and Fleet Manager systems that monitor and control a plant’s operation from ingredient handling to the store. In this day and age where food safety is a must, the paperless information system tracks and traces production, warehousing and distribution in real time, says Paul Crutzen, PCData’s owner. (www.pcdata.nl)

The Horstmann Group’s BAKY oven is for consumers and in-store bakeries who want their rolls literally fresh out of the oven. The unique combination oven and display case can bake off two varieties of rolls at the same time at a rate of about 320 pieces an hour. The rolls can be shaped as a cube, discus or cylinder, but not spherical, flaky or soft products, such as croissants or pretzels. Meanwhile, its Kemper division showed off the President 150a, a 525-lb. fork mixer with direct frictional wheel drive that provides effortless bowl handling and large ground clearance for easy cleaning. (www.geminibe.com)

Revent International’s Model 703 multi-rack oven is designed to handle up to four single racks, depending on their size. The oven comes in gas, oil or electric heat and is engineered for optimal bottom heat to provide superior oven jump and maximum lift to baked goods, says Rafael Diaz Molina, manager of marketing and sales. (www.revent.com)

Rheon Automatic Machinery Co. highlighted its CORNUCOPIA KN 400, which can produce a variety of breads, hot snacks and savory foods including a filled pizza toast, open top pizza breads and bagels filled with jam or cheese. The possibilities include spherical shape molding, spherical encrusting, bar shape molding, continuous swirl extrusion and more. (www.rheon.com)