Butter and Margarine

Appears in
Professional Cooking: 10th Edition
Professional Cooking

By Wayne Gisslen

Published 2025

  • About
Shortenings are manufactured to have certain textures and hardness. Butter, on the other hand, is a natural product that doesn’t have these advantages. It is hard and brittle when cold and soft at room temperature, and it melts easily. Consequently, doughs made with butter are hard to handle. Margarine is a little easier to handle, but it has many of the same disadvantages.
On the other hand, butter and margarine have two major advantages:
  1. Flavor. Shortenings are intentionally flavorless, but butter has a highly desirable flavor.
  2. Melting qualities. Butter melts in the mouth. Shortenings do not. After eating pastries or icings made with shortening, one can be left with an unpleasant film of shortening coating the mouth.