Catania Oils Announces Three Shortenings To Meet A Variety Of Baking Needs

Catania Oils, the Northeast’s largest processer and packager of plant-based oils, has announced the availability of three shortenings designed to meet a variety of baking needs: all-purpose palm shortening, cake and icing shortening, and heavy-duty fry shortening.  

Shortenings are an essential ingredient in flakey and aerated baked goods. Shortening’s high fat content prevents gluten and starch from adhering to each other better than butter and oil, yielding the tenderest baked goods.

“Many of our customers have asked if we could develop a line of shortening products to enhance their foods,” noted Stephen Basile, Executive Vice President of Catania Oils. “We’re pleased to bring the same exceptional quality and flavor of our oils to three different shortening products for a wide range of banking, icing and frying needs.”

Catania Oils’ All-Purpose Palm Shortening is applicable across a variety of recipes due to its wide plastic range, which makes it easy to mix. Its smooth, mixable texture makes all-purpose shortening a great alternative to butter, which is more difficult to cream or work. All-purpose shortening contains about 10% air trapped in the fat, which is important for leavening. It is ideal for use in products where it is creamed, (cookies), or rubbed into flour, (pie crusts).

All-purpose shortening is suitable in non-baking applications as well. It provides a long fry life and is a great choice for making fried products such as donuts or fried chicken. It is also a valuable ingredient in hair and skin products due to its smooth texture and ability to lock in moisture. All-purpose shortening is ideal for companies that produce several products and do not want to stock shortenings separately for each application.

Catania Oils’ Cake and Icing Shortening offers great functionality for cakes and icings. It is emulsified and specifically formulated to absorb the higher quantities of liquid and sugar that cakes and icings require. Catania Oils’ Cake and Icing Shortening is a valuable component in both the core pastry and the icing on top, yielding creamy icing with lots of volume and moist cakes with great crumb structure. This shortening is an ideal choice for bakers specializing in cakes.

With its high smoke point and neutral flavor profile, shortening is ideal for frying and deep frying. Catania Oils’ Heavy-Duty Fry Shortening is formulated to reduce oil absorption in fried products, creating a perfect crisp on fried items. Catania Oils’ fry shortening offers superior glaze and icing adhesion for donuts as well as a quick glaze and icing setup time. Its long fry life and ability to reduce oil absorption makes it ideal for companies who specialize in making donuts and other fried or deep-fried foods.

All of Catania Oils’ shortening formulas are free of partially hydrogenated oils and have zero grams of trans fat per serving. Additionally, all are RSPO certified, which means that they were produced in compliance with the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO)’s sustainability guidelines and all workers were compensated fairly.

For further information or to purchase the shortenings, please visit https://cataniaoils.com/resource/bakery-shortenings/