Slideshow: Wayne Farms channel surfs with sous vide technology
The company launches its first product for retail, putting its Naked Truth brand in Sam’s Club stores.
Wayne Farms shows off the Naked Truth
Within weeks of announcing the launch of its first retail-ready, sous vide, fully cooked premium chicken product at Sam’s Club, MEAT+POULTRY was invited back to Decatur, Alabama, to see how the Naked Truth line was developed as well as a farm-to-fork look at the production practices and processing technology behind the brand.
Wayne Farms breast fillets
The Naked Truth stand-up, recloseable pouch holds six, 5-oz. individually wrapped breast fillets. The packaging provided Wayne Farms’ marketers plenty of real estate to highlight the product’s premium attributes, including: flame grilled, fully cooked sous vide as well as production claims, including: GAP step 2 certified, 100% vegetarian diet and farm raised.
Customer Innovation Center
As part of its expanding into new markets in 2018, including development of the Naked Truth brand for Sam’s Club stores, Wayne Farms invested $4.5 million in a new Customer Innovation Center, adjacent to its Decatur, Alabama, prepared foods processing plant. The 15,000-sq.-ft. facility includes a commercial test kitchen, two pilot production plants and ample meeting rooms and workspace designed to facilitate collaboration between customers and Wayne’s R&D experts.
In charge of innovation
Frank Jock, Wayne Farms’ corporate chef, welcomes visitors to the company’s new Customer Innovation Center.
Showing off Wayne Farms
Raw materials for the Naked Truth retail products are shipped twice a week from Wayne Farms’ primary processing plant in Dothan, Alabama, to its Decatur plant about 280 miles north. When the Naked Truth product isn’t being processed, the facility utilizes the sous vide technology to produce NAE (no antibiotics ever) products for foodservice customers.
Unitherm Aquaflow system
Wayne Farms’ sous vide technology includes a Unitherm Aquaflow system. The three-tier, water-based cooking equipment spans 63-ft. long and is 17-ft. tall. “It’s like a giant submarine,” says Beau Batchelor, R&D manager.
Chicken prep
Raw chicken breasts are fire-seared and grill-marked prior to packaging and cooking.
Fire tunnel
The uniformly shaped and grill-marked chicken breasts leave the Unitherm Tunnel of Fire before being vacuum packed for cooking.
Going up!
Vacuum-packaged chicken breasts travel up a spiral conveyor to the top of the sous vide cooking system.
Temperature check
A quality assurance specialist monitors the temperature of the agitating water during the sous vide cooking process.
Leak check
Samples of fully cooked products are regularly checked for leaks just before the pouches are dried and packaged.
Finishing touches
Depending on the customer, sous vide-cooked chicken processed at the Decatur plant can be made using 4-oz., 5-oz. or 6-oz. breasts.
