Post by ctann on Oct 14, 2019 13:57:58 GMT -5
Hi all,
I'm on batch 3 of my bean-to-bar adventures, so still early days. My process is working well and all three batches have come out great. The end result has a great temper, but the liquid chocolate is very thick - fine for pouring a rustic slab on a silicon mat, a challenge for dipping truffles, and very tough for molding. Prior to making from bean, I had used Callebaut pastils for my molding work, and that was very successful.
I have done the tempering a little differently each time, but results have been similar. Here is what I did with the most recent batch (from 1kg of Madagascar Ambanja beans, cut to 80% with cane sugar)
- Pour from Melanger into a heat controlled pot with stirrer (a Kitchaid stand mixer with a "Precise Heat Mixing Bowl")
- Heat to 118F (while stirring)
- Cool to 80F (while stirring 1x every minute). Cooling is ambient, so it took a long time, I'm going to work on this step.
- Heat to 90F
- Hold at 90F while getting ready to dip or pour
Compared to some of the processes I see online, mine seems quite simplistic, but except for the viscosity the results are exactly what I want. I was hesitant to push the temperature up above 90F to try to get the chocolate to thin out. Perhaps I am just spoiled by the ease of tempering and using Callebaut (it is, after all, specifically formulated for that purpose), and molding with viscous chocolate is something I'll have to learn to deal with? I'm guessing that adding extra cocoa butter would likely get me to a thinner end result, but if there is a process tweak I could try first, I would rather do that.
As a ps, one of my goals in all of my kitchen adventures is to create a process that can be automated as much as possible (i.e. by setting a timer to let me know when the next step is required, rather than hovering over a pot), and requires the least amount of cleaning up. I'm a "lazy engineer", which means I am more than willing to put in up-front effort, if it saves me long term effort!
Cheers,
Chris.
I'm on batch 3 of my bean-to-bar adventures, so still early days. My process is working well and all three batches have come out great. The end result has a great temper, but the liquid chocolate is very thick - fine for pouring a rustic slab on a silicon mat, a challenge for dipping truffles, and very tough for molding. Prior to making from bean, I had used Callebaut pastils for my molding work, and that was very successful.
I have done the tempering a little differently each time, but results have been similar. Here is what I did with the most recent batch (from 1kg of Madagascar Ambanja beans, cut to 80% with cane sugar)
- Pour from Melanger into a heat controlled pot with stirrer (a Kitchaid stand mixer with a "Precise Heat Mixing Bowl")
- Heat to 118F (while stirring)
- Cool to 80F (while stirring 1x every minute). Cooling is ambient, so it took a long time, I'm going to work on this step.
- Heat to 90F
- Hold at 90F while getting ready to dip or pour
Compared to some of the processes I see online, mine seems quite simplistic, but except for the viscosity the results are exactly what I want. I was hesitant to push the temperature up above 90F to try to get the chocolate to thin out. Perhaps I am just spoiled by the ease of tempering and using Callebaut (it is, after all, specifically formulated for that purpose), and molding with viscous chocolate is something I'll have to learn to deal with? I'm guessing that adding extra cocoa butter would likely get me to a thinner end result, but if there is a process tweak I could try first, I would rather do that.
As a ps, one of my goals in all of my kitchen adventures is to create a process that can be automated as much as possible (i.e. by setting a timer to let me know when the next step is required, rather than hovering over a pot), and requires the least amount of cleaning up. I'm a "lazy engineer", which means I am more than willing to put in up-front effort, if it saves me long term effort!
Cheers,
Chris.