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Impact of Fat on Dough and Cookie Properties of Sugar-Snap Cookies

¹Laboratory of Food Chemistry and Biochemistry and Leuven Food Science and Nutrition Research Centre (LFoRCe), Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Kasteelpark Arenberg 20, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium. ²Corresponding author. Phone: +32 (0) 16321575. Fax: +32 (0) 16321997. E-mail: bram.pareyt@biw.kuleuven.be

Fat, one of the three major ingredients of sugar-snap cookies, affects dough properties, changes in dough dimensions during baking, and in the end, the properties of the baked product. We studied the effect of reducing fat levels (from 15.8 to 8.7% on a dough basis) on dough and cookie properties and related it to the SDS extractable protein (SDSEP) levels. Reducing fat levels increased dough elasticity (from 0.19 to 0.60 MPa) and dough intrinsic hardness (from 8.6 to 27.5 N·cm³/g). Because no differences in dough SDSEP levels were noticed when fat levels were reduced, the increased dough elasticity and hardness were related to a more pronounced physical gluten entanglement. Reducing fat levels in the recipe decreased the SDSEP levels of the baked cookies, indicating more protein cross-linking during baking with lower fat levels. Our data show that the dispersed fat phase interferes with the formation of a gluten network during baking. Reducing the fat level in the recipe increased the intrinsic cookie break strength (from 39.5 to 100.3 N·cm³/g), which was related to more gluten cross-linking.