We'd love to hear more behind the scenes advice from Richard (and his Dad), but maybe we can help clarify Cat. In production style baking, it is often necessary to break up large tasks so that the bakers can get all of their beautiful baked goods out for sale in the morning. A retarder is simply a small (or large) box where you can control the temperature and humidity in order to control rise times. Most bakeries will briefly freeze their laminated doughs as the process is labor intensive and this allows them to spread the work out over several days.

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