Lamination butter - what exactly is it?

Butter with special properties 

Lamination butter in the form of sheets or blocks is a special butter for the production of Danish pastries, puff pastry and croissants. Lamination butter is available with different melting points for different applications. It differs from German brand butter in terms of its consistency; other or additional production processes such as recombining make the butter more plastic and less water-permeable. 

By using milk fat fractions, the melting point can be increased and melting points of up to 38°C can be achieved. As with normal butter, the fat content is 82%. A higher melting point makes processing easier because the sheet does not oil out as quickly during the lamination process. These sheets  are particularly interesting if the ambient conditions in production are not ideal. Lamination butter can also contain the natural colouring agent carotene for a beautiful colouring of the baked goods.

The use of touring butter brings many advantages

The use of special butter for lamination instead of conventional butter has clear advantages for the baker: Fluctuation-free product quality throughout the year, greater plasticity, firmness and elasticity as well as specially adjusted melting points and product properties make the lamination process considerably easier and ensure a consistently high quality of the finished baked goods.

In the artisan sector, 2 kg butter sheets are usually used. For Danish pastries, 3 single runs are common and for classic puff pastry baked goods, two single and two double runs.  This creates many individual layers of dough. The butter separates these layers of dough so that the typical flaky structure can be created during baking. The particularly plastically butter sheet prevent the individual layers from breaking and smearing and the fat layers remain undamaged, preventing the water contained in the dough from escaping. The water vapour produced during baking causes the pastry to puff up and lifts the layers of dough away from each other. This is how the typical puffed butter pastry is created.

Lamination butter sheet range from the specialist Hoche Butter 

Lamination butter sheets are part of Hoche Butter's core range. As a specialist in dairy fats, we have many years of experience in the production of lamination butter and our sheets have been highly valued in the artisanal baking trade for many decades. All sheets have a fat content of 82%, just like normal butter.  

The Plunder Butterplatte is our standard sheet with a melting point of 30-34 °C. Suitable for all Danish pastry and puff pastry. It gives the finished pastry a full buttery flavour and a fine flaky texture with a tender crumb. 

Our Croissant Butterplatte has a slightly higher melting point of 36-38 °C, which makes the sheet very machine-friendly and highly resilient. This sheet is ideal for making croissants and pastries. 

Like the Plunder Butterplatte, the Carotin Butterplatte has a melting point of 30-34 °C. The addition of the natural colouring carotene gives the pastry a slightly more intense colour. Equally suitable for savoury and sweet Danish pastries and puff pastries.  

With a melting point of 35 °C, the Universal Butterplatte lies exactly between the Plunder Butterplatte and the Croissant Butterplatte. It is ideal for the production of puff pastry and Danish pastry of all kinds and has improved processing properties and stability, especially at higher ambient temperatures. And despite its higher melting point, it gives the finished pastry a very good mouthfeel with the typical melting of butter.