Puff pastry with low saturated fat contents: The role of fat and dough physical interactions in the development of a layered structure

• The physical behavior of fat can be described as that of solid layers alternating with soft gel layers, i.e. the bulk dough.
• Elastic-like behavior of the pastry dough increases with progressive sheeting.
• Elastic-like behavior of pastry dough increases with increasing fat consistency, until an optimum is reached.
• The best fat-layered structure and puff pastry baking quality is obtained around that optimum.

In puff pastry, fat and dough rheological behavior during sheeting control pastry dough development by formation of the layered structure which is essential for product quality. The aim of this work was to unravel the influence of fat and dough physical interactions during sheeting, as affected by variations in fat composition, to the rheological behavior, the microstructure and baking performance of pastry dough. Rheological data at small and large deformations were collected on bulk dough and pastry dough as function of sheeting steps and fat composition. The resistance of fat to work related deformation, i.e. fat consistency, and softening behavior during sheeting were also studied by means of a multi extrusion cell. The physical interaction of bulk dough and bulk fat during sheeting promoted progressive structuring of the pastry dough in a multi-layer system of solid layers alternating with soft gel layers. Structuring resulted in increasing elastic-like behavior and consistency of the pastry dough. Pastry dough elastic-like behavior and consistency increased with increasing fat consistency, until a maximum was reached. Such maximum corresponded to an ideal fat-layered structure, as indicated by microscopic analysis, and provided puff pastry with the best baking and textural quality. A further increase in fat consistency had detrimental effect on pastry dough structure and baking performance.

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