Assembly Line

How sandwich cookies are made

A sandwich cookie is two baked wafers stuck together by a cream filling squirted between them.

stations
7
things upstream
34
raw sources
14
steps from the ground
9

The short version

At the Oreo plant in Montreal, machines do all the work. A giant vessel blends flour, sugar and two kinds of cocoa into dough. A molding machine cuts rounds and imprints the pattern, and an oven bakes them. A fan cools the wafers, which are flipped so that another machine can put filling on half of them and press the other half on top before wrapping.

  1. Blend the dough

    Flour, sugar, fat and two kinds of cocoa go into a mixing vessel in a batch that fills a 2,000-lb tub, then blend into a single dough.

    Goes in
    FlourSugarVegetable oilCocoa powder

  2. Cut and imprint rounds

    A molding machine cuts the dough into circles and presses the brand's pattern into the face of each one in the same pass.

  3. Bake the wafers

    The rounds travel through an oven and come out as crisp dark wafers.

  4. Cool and flip

    Fans cool the wafers, then a flipping step turns half of them over so their flat sides face up for the filling.

  5. Whip the filling

    Sugar and fat are whipped smooth in a separate mixer and pumped to the sandwiching line.

    Goes in
    SugarPalm oil

  6. Deposit and sandwich

    A machine dispenses a measured dollop of cream onto half the wafers, and the other half are pressed on top.

  7. Stack and wrap

    Finished sandwiches are stacked in rows and sealed in wrapping for shipment to retailers.

End of the lineSandwich cookie

Worth repeating

  • By 2017, more than 40 billion Oreo cookies were being produced annually in 18 countries.
  • The Oreo biscuit was first produced by Nabisco in early 1912 at its Chelsea factory in New York City.
  • A 2022 study in Physics of Fluids found the cream filling always sticks to one wafer when an Oreo is twisted apart, however fast the twist.

Back to the ground

Follow every input upstream and sandwich cookie starts as these 14 raw sources.

WheatWaterSugarcaneSugar beetSoybeansRapeseedClayCocoa beansOil palm fruitAirLimestoneCrude oilCornNatural gas

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Cardboard box 5 stations · 17 raw sources Fiberglass insulation 6 stations · 8 raw sources Zinc oxide 5 stations · 4 raw sources Carpet 6 stations · 8 raw sources Match 5 stations · 9 raw sources Tofu 7 stations · 3 raw sources

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Sources

Cite this page: "How sandwich cookies are made." Assembly Line, 2026-11-03. https://assemblyline.org/make/sandwich-cookie

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