Extrusion baking of cookies containing heat and shear sensitive additives

Abstract

An extrusion processed cookie is produced having shear sensitive particulates and/or heat sensitive additions uniformly dispersed therein. A dry flour blend, including flour, dry milk solids and salt is added to a blending zone of a cooker-extruder with a fat or shortening. The mixture is blended and heat-treated in a heating zone of the extruder under high temperatures without fat separation to form a heat-treated mass. The heat-treated mass is cooled in a cooling zone followed by the addition of a sugar, heat sensitive and/or shear sensitive ingredient to form a cookie composition. Water is also introduced to the cooling zone in an amount effective to produce a dough-like consistency. The heat-treated cookie composition is extruded and shaped into an unleavened and unexpanded cookie dough piece. The cookie pieces are then leavened by heating in a convection, microwave or radio frequency oven to produce a leavened cookie having a crumb-like structure.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.