Puff pastry margarines have always been a challenge for the margarine industry to produce due to the many demands of the margarine such as a non-greasy surface so that the margarine is easy to work with both by hand and by extrusion process, very plastic, so that it can be folded without breaking, because breaks will lead to insufficient lift and flaky structure in the puff pastries, high functionality so that the best expansion can be obtained. In recent years new challenges such as no trans fatty acids in the margarines, no hydrogenated fats in the margarine and no lecithin in the margarine have been added. Furthermore, the fat content in puff pastry is significant because the amount of margarine rolled into the dough is approx. 35%. Consequently, there is, both because of declarations and also because of the costs of raw materials, now a wish to reduce the fat content of the margarine. This article discusses the possibilities for fulfilling the above demands and also by trials and evaluations demonstrate some important parameters. Puff pastry and puff pastry margarines Puff pastry is characterised by its laminated structure of baked layers of dough separated by thin layers of margarine or fat. The ratio between the dough and the margarine is typically 2:1, as illustrated in table 1. During the lamination process each layer of dough will be separated by one layer of margarine. In puff pastry the numbers of layers are typically 144 or 288. However, puff pastries with up to 1458 layers are also produced. After preparation of the dough the layers can be illustrated as in figure 1 (across). Figure 1: Puff pastry dough with layers of dough and margarine. Dough Margarine After baking this lamination of the dough will result in a puff pastry with a nice lamination and volume (expressed as height and expansion). Table 1: Typical recipe for puff pastries Ingredient Flour Salt Water Puff pastry margarine Roll in with puff pastry margarine. weight 1000 g 10 g 550 g 100 g 900 g % 39.1 % 0.4 % 21.4 % 3.9 % 35.2 % Palsgaard Technical Paper, October 2011 Puff pastry margarine - Focusing on functionality and fat reductions. 2
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