Margarine is often found at the breakfast table, providing a quick and tasty addition to your sandwiches, toasts, hot biscuits and fresh muffins. Cooks and bakers use a lot of margarine in their recipes. Soft margarine (in tub) is used for spreading, liquid blends (in bottle) for cooking and hard blocks (in wrapper) are great for baking. Apart from that, it comes in fat levels varying from 20%-90%. Depending on the final outcome you wish to have (brittle, soft, crispy, fluffy, smooth, spongy, puff) and the kind of recipe you need it for (cookie, croissants, pizza dough, ready-made meal, puff pastry) the margarine delivered will slightly differ.

Spreading & Cooking

Spreading

For each slice of bread or toast, use half a tablespoon of margarine or fat spread. Margarines in tubs are spreadable right from the fridge. There is no waiting for them to soften and everyone can handle with ease – no more torn bread!

Cooking

For frying, you can use a spoonful of liquid margarine (in bottle). Liquid margarine changes from opaque to translucent, when it reaches the right temperature – and when it gets there, it refrains from spattering. Happy days for you, your steak, and anything else you would like to fry!

Topping & Baking

Topping

Margarines (in tub) or liquid margarines (in bottle) work well on steamy vegetables (including potato puree), baked potatoes or pasta. At snack time, melted margarine is an excellent topping for freshly popped popcorn.

Baking

Fat contributes texture and browning properties to foods. This is critical to know when baking. Any of the margarine formats is suitable: liquid margarines (in bottle), hard margarines (in wrapper) and soft margarines (in tub).

Make your own margarine!

A lot of thought, a lot of effort and a lot of good stuff go into margarine. First, plant seeds are harvested for oil production. The vegetable oils and a bit of solid fat are blended together for optimal taste, nutrition, quality and texture. The resulting blend is mixed with water. That’s your base. You can’t make margarine without. Then you need to hold oil and water together – things like lecithin or, if you’re doing it at home, egg yolk, do this job. Next comes citric acid or lemon juice – they keep your margarine fresh. Last of the key ingredients is salt to enhance the flavour of the margarine. There are others – but those are the essentials.

About us

Founded in 1958 and based in Brussels, the International Margarine Association of the Countries of Europe (IMACE) represents margarine manufacturers, producing both for retail and business to business (B2B) sectors throughout Europe. IMACE is also the voice of margarine manufacturers to key stakeholders/authorities of the European Union and other international organisations. IMACE and its Member Associations and Companies are members of IFMA, the International Federation of Margarine Associations. IMACE is member of FoodDrinkEurope, the European Food and Drink Industry Federation.

Go to www.imace.org or contact us