|
Post by sugaralchemy on May 27, 2006 23:07:52 GMT -5
I'm tossing this out to the chocolate eating audience here... how dark is too dark for you? What is your personal limit?
What limits your preference as far as darkness goes? Is it that there's too much chocolate flavor or too much bitterness? Is it that there's not enough sweetness to enhance the chocolate flavor?
Does anybody find plain liquor enjoyable?
|
|
|
Post by chocdoc on May 28, 2006 8:07:48 GMT -5
It's a mood thing. Sometimes I really like the dark, dark stuff, sometimes I really like the creamy milk stuff.
I do use plain liquor to mold coconut centres, cuts the excessive sweetness.
|
|
|
Post by vivachoco on Jun 19, 2006 16:54:35 GMT -5
personally, there is no such a thing as 'too dark'. more chocolate-chocolate-chocolate taste the better. there is too bitter though.
i think chocolate is one of those things were it is hard to do a 'blind-fold' test: whatever chocolate taste we grew up with is the 'right' kind. one likes merlot, the other goes for zinfandel.
one of my favorites has been scharffenberger 99%. i just did my first attempt at my own chocolate (ocumare/criollo 80%) in my quest for the perfect dark chocolate that would be smooth but not too sweet and not too bitter. the first tasting made me cringe: too bitter.
ugh. i had failed.
then i my my desperation, for breakfast - instead of having 'fiber' to go with my espresso bean coffee - I did a blind-fold test with random chocolates i had in my fridge (i always have a lot)
99% scherffenberger 71% chocovic forastero 60% generic Trader Joe's Chirardelli baking chocolate i heart NY milk chocolate (by Paramount) 70% Fazer exclusive thin dark and my new 80% ocumare
- so no surprise, the finnish FAZER tasted most like the chocolate i imagine should taste like (i am from finland), but a bit too sweet - my old favorite scharffenberger 99% taste was way too thin and hollow and lacking... chocolate (how can a 99% cocoa chocolate lack taste of chocolate?) - chocovic was smooth but too sweet and slightly... leathery - Trader Joe's was way too sweet and boring - Chirardelly made me want to spit it out - milk chocolate was not chocolate it was more like... sugar and... toffee. yuck. - surprisingly my 80% was not too shabby. it had fuller taste than any of the others. i will just have to experiment with beans, roast, formula (yeah yeah, there is a lot to fix) to eliminate that impression of bitterness.
but my point: nothing is too dark. just depends on what you happen to think CHOCOLATE should taste like.
|
|
|
Post by sugaralchemy on Jun 19, 2006 17:27:20 GMT -5
I think I need to clarify my query... darkness is not entirely a function of the cacao percentage. The cacao mass is liquor percentage PLUS butter percentage. That butter factor can be quite a headache! I've pulled out some algebra and worked through El Rey's entire line of chocolate and made some observations I want to share: Bucare Dark Chocolate 58.5% - liquor content 44.7% Mijao Dark Chocolate 61% - liquor content 47% Gran Saman Dark Chocolate 70% - liquor content 70.5% (this is probably higher due to tiny rounding/analysis/etc error) Apamate Dark Chocolate 73.5% - liquor content 67.4% (look at that - higher "cacao content" yet less liquor) Cariaco Dark Chocolate 60.5% - liquor content 46% Macuro Dark Chocolate 70% - liquor content 61.3% This is based on the technical data found here: www.elreychocolates.com/technical.htmlYou can read some nice organoleptic descriptions here: www.elreychocolates.com/p-description.htmlMore butter helps suppress bitterness, but decreases sugar levels. It also decreases the viscosity, creating more of a couverture chocolate textural experience. I would encourage you to consider both the liquor content and the butter content separately. I'm not sure why we have popularized the "cacao mass" number which is liquor + butter, it seems so unclear. If anybody wants, I can post more data on calculating the percentages and such. As for me... I have no problems eating liquor in plain form these days. The taste is most intense that way and you really get the maximum raw experience. And it makes even 88% liquor content chocolate taste sweet! Really though, you can't compare liquor (even if there's vanilla added, like the Scharffen Berger stuff) to a sweetened chocolate. The texture, taste, etc is substantially altered by even moderate levels of sugar. Sugar is an excellent flavor enhancer, so it does make sense a liquor might actually not taste as chocolatey as you would like. But sugar also masks other tastes, particularly bitterness, so the taste you're getting from sugar is sort of like putting the flavor on steroids... is it impressive? Maybe, but is it real? At the very least... it is very different.
|
|
|
Post by vivachoco on Jun 19, 2006 19:24:08 GMT -5
to be exact, according to my calculations the chocolate i made is 76.77% cocoa liquor, 6.11% cocoa butter, 17.1% sugar (if my math skills are not failing me). so yeah, i consider it dark -- and i agree about sugar -- it masks taste when i would like the taste to be 'revealed' -- i would like to stay away from sugar even more (maybe i should try salt? ).
|
|
|
Post by sugaralchemy on Jun 19, 2006 19:54:39 GMT -5
Maybe you should consider trying more cocoa butter and less sugar? It might "reveal" the taste more... fat is incredibly effective at potentiating taste, although it will mute bitterness (in a different way than sugar, interestingly) which you may or may not like.
For whatever it is worth, I have certain types of fat that don't mute bitterness like this... I also have ingredients that act like sugar in chocolate but are not sweet. You get the texture without the taste, or the calories and blood sugar impact.
You may also want to experiment with lecithin (and other emulsifiers, but I doubt you have access to anything beyond lecithin - although PGPR, citrem, and ammonium phosphatide aka YN are all lots of fun) which helps disperse chocolate (which is fat-based) in your mouth better and will slightly alter the taste profile and texture. If you are aiming to alter taste and texture, and less concerned with viscosity, I would say maybe try 1% liquid lecithin and see what you think of it. You could just add it to melted liquor or a dark chocolate and then temper it and see what you think - no refining required. Just play around a bit.
If you are experimenting with very dark chocolate and aren't opposed to vanilla, I think you could have a lot of fun with it, probably at higher than normal levels to help it show through the strong chocolate taste. I have some very good Vanilla planifora "beans" out of Uganda that has this wonderful "sweet" aroma... almost like the smell of cotton candy being made distilled into a flavor and crossed with a tropical vanilla taste. It's not sweet per se, but the taste has some of those same pleasant notes... but it wouldn't alter your perception of taste nearly so much as sugar does, and it would add a lot of additional complexity. (I have numerous types of vanilla and love pairing the perfect vanilla with the perfect chocolate!) Note that the Scharffen Berger 99% stuff you like is made with vanilla.
This is the beauty of making chocolate for yourself... you can make it exactly the way you like it. You might even create something new and highly desirable, if you're not careful.
|
|
|
Post by vivachoco on Jun 19, 2006 20:32:25 GMT -5
i like the way you think my remaining 1% was equal part liquid lecithin and madagaskar vanilla. your idea to start testing with different vanillas - i like it i like it!!! where how when need it now!!! and also, yes next time (i think i will make another batch mid-week -- unless i should wait for your vanilla?) i think i will increase cocoa and have less sugar. i am hypoglycemic so i am always trying to restrict sugar / find alternative ways to get high instead of that blood sugar impact... however i HATE most artificial sweeteners. I have yet to find alternatives - even organic - that i would like (other than honey). i don't even like stevia.
|
|
|
Post by sugaralchemy on Jun 20, 2006 1:54:09 GMT -5
Vanilla is great! While it's not about the cacao bean itself so much as many members here pursue, vanilla plus cacao is like listening to a symphony, whereas cacao alone is more like a beautiful violin. Each has huge positive attributes and is an elegant and beautiful experience in and of itself... but they are simply different. There are two very different vanilla species. Vanilla planiflora is the one you're most familiar with. Vanilla tahitensis is a different variety with a very different taste, and substantially less vanillin. If smelled, most Americans would not think "vanilla" - it is that different. There are also other species of vanilla, but these are the two most common and distinct. The variety of vanilla has a substantial impact on taste and smell, but the region it is grown and the curing process also has a huge impact. Each region produces a slightly different bean. I would argue that vanilla is at least as complex as cacao if not more so, but I suspect that would get me thrown out of these forums I have on hand vanilla from Mexico, Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, Uganda and Madagascar. I actually have both planiflora and tahitensis from some of these regions and sometimes vanilla from multiple different farms in the same region. Suffice to say, I have an entire section dedicated just to vanilla beans. (Actually, technically they are pods, not beans... but I'm no botanist.) A good vanilla bean should be slightly oily when you get it, appearing slightly glossy from the brownish oil. The bean should be plump. I just got a shipment of half a pound of organic tahitensis from a new supplier and they're so incredibly oily and soft, it's like vanilla heaven. Probably some of the best beans I have seen in a long, long time. When adding it to chocolate, I would suggest you chop the whole bean and toss it into the food processor with the sugar that you're powdering and get it very very well-chopped - it should look just like vanilla bean specs, all of it. Some beans are quite fibrous and unless you chop the fibers that run the length of the bean - preferably with both a knife and a food processor - the Santha won't get the bean fibers fully broken down if it is a fibrous type, like the Ugandan beans tend to be. Normally this isn't a textural issue, but occasionally you might notice, and it would be very obvious in white chocolate. You could also try scraping out the bean, but I think that just wastes some potential flavor. Typically levels of vanilla are on the lower side in chocolate, but I would encourage you to explore, particularly in an unsweetened or non-sweetened chocolate. I would venture as high as 1%, being sure to chop well. If you have a vanilla that goes well with your cacao... it is like a symphony, and levels that high are really actually quite appealing. As for alternative sweeteners, there is a lengthy thread on that topic which sebastian and myself have bantered back and fourth for quite a while. If you are not planning to use a lot and don't need a lot of sweetness, erythritol might work - zero blood sugar response, zero gastric tolerance issues, basically zero calories. They even make organic erythritol, but I'm not sure it's available to consumers. Alternatively, you could try something like isomalt if you want less sweetness but more texture and less cooling effect than erythritol - it is very low glycemic, but it can cause gastric distress. There's also a million other ingredients out there (and most of them sitting on my shelf) that act like sugar... but they are very hard if not impossible for the average person to get. If you just want to control blood sugar response, you could also try fructose. It's intensely sweet (~1.75 times as sweet as sugar) so you need less (which could bode very well with your goal of super dark chocolate). Fructose has a very small impact on blood sugar, as it is processed through the liver, but I wouldn't overdo it - fructose is implicated as causing all sorts of problems (obesity, high triglycerides, etc) when consumed in excess. The key if you want to try integrating high intensity sweeteners (stevia, splenda, etc) is synergy for increased sweetness and decreased off-tastes and aftertastes. Try a touch of a good stevia with erythritol - instantly the product is maybe one and a half times to two times as sweet as before, and the off-tastes of stevia are gone completely. You can even have synergy between multiple high intensity sweeteners. It's a crazy world, sweeteners. If you wanted sweetness with minimum bulk, you might try fructose plus a LITTLE bit of a high intensity sweetener. The only one to avoid at all costs is aspartame - it tastes terrible with chocolate, and some people seem to be sensitive to it.
|
|
|
Post by vivachoco on Jun 21, 2006 18:15:26 GMT -5
i had to think a bit of your response. so much info there, thanks so much.
on fructose: where would i get it? just -- any store / health food store? and are you saying it is generally worse for you than regular sugar (apart from the blood sugar response thing being better)?
erythritol sounds chemical. i think i would want to stay away from anything chemical. on that note - have you ever tried xylitol with chocolate?
i think for my next batch i would want to try and increase cocoa butter and vanilla a little bit and keep sugar low. i also have a feeling that cocoa beans and the roast will have a lot to do with need for sugar. but i am still such a novice that i am far far away from really knowing anything about that.
thanks for all your advice.
|
|
|
Post by sugaralchemy on Jun 21, 2006 22:29:22 GMT -5
Fructose is available at health food stores and in the bulk section of most stores with a moderate bulk section. If you get a good deal, it should be about twice the price of sugar - or about US $0.70-80/lb. Fructose is found in fruits and is not harmful in small amounts, but as the quantities get up there, it does tend to raise triglycerides which is not good for you. It's your call, but my advice would be to keep your consumption moderate, as most people consuming a western diet are already consuming too much - soda pop and other products made with high fructose corn syrup are the culprit. Erythritol may sound bad, but how about dihydrogen monoxide? That stuff is nasty, read about it at dhmo.org/ - seriously though, look at that site. It is 100% factual. But do you know what dihydrogen monoxide really is? WATER! It's just a different way of saying it. You can drum up fear about nearly ANYTHING, and that's what that site proves. And unlike a lot of fear-monger websites that focus on various foodstuffs, dhmo.org doesn't even contain factual errors! Seriously, it is shocking how many sites go on and on about how terrible various foodstuffs are, while they ignore huge bodies of solid, well-supported information about the real harms of other food ingredients they eat every day. Basically, you seriously need to look at the REAL science behind stuff, not on how you feel about the name or whether it is considered "natural" or not - realize that so many deadly toxins like lead, arsenic, cyanide, mercury and many more things are all natural. That said, erythritol is a natural substance that is found in some fruits, mushrooms, and various other sources. It is perfectly healthy for you, and has no gastric side effects and virtually no calories or blood sugar impact. It is actually primarily absorbed and excreted unchanged. Xylitol works in chocolate, but it has a massive cooling effect just like erythritol, but unlike erythritol it is fairly likely to cause gastric distress, and it also has quite a few calories and a larger impact on blood sugar. I would suggest you give erythritol a try before you use xylitol, simply because nobody likes to have "gastric distress" from enjoying chocolate.
|
|
|
Post by vivachoco on Jun 22, 2006 3:03:43 GMT -5
Ok. You talked me into it. Erythritol that is. I am going to find info on it and also ask for it at the health food store. Lets see what I can find tomorrow... as I am going through withdrawal symptoms: I need to be making chocolate again. Now, what do you mean by a cooling effect? If I use erythritol, should I modify something in the process? Thanks
|
|
|
Post by vivachoco on Jun 22, 2006 18:17:34 GMT -5
I got some delicious looking tahitian vanilla.
a stupid question: what would happen if i chopped it up and then tried to put it through the champion juicer, along with my cocoa beans?
|
|
|
Post by sugaralchemy on Jun 22, 2006 23:48:02 GMT -5
I would say go for it, with the vanilla in the champion, although I have never worked with the device. Finer is better as far as I'm concerned with vanilla, and that would bring it down in texture even faster.
Erythritol has a negative heat of solution - meaning that when it dissolves, it actually cools in temperature slightly. Sugar has a negative heat of solution as well, although sugar isn't quite so pronounced. Just taste a little erythritol when you get your hands on it.
This negative heat of solution will not impact your chocolate production process, but this cooling effect will impact the texture (making it dissolve a little differently on your tongue), particularly if you use a lot. But since you're not using a lot, I don't think you'll have a big issue with it, and it is quite literally the most perfect sugar replacer on the market to date from a nutritional standpoint (basically no calories or blood sugar impact, yet it has bulk.)
Just give it a try and see at maybe 5-10% for a very dark chocolate like you prefer. Start out with a little and see what you get then make changes with high intensity sweeteners or more erythritol. I would suggest you try a VERY small amount of a high intensity sweetener (good quality stevia, splenda would be my top picks, or acesulfame potassium if you can get it) along with the erythritol if you feel you want more sweetness than the erythritol alone provides.
|
|
|
Post by vivachoco on Jun 23, 2006 0:46:34 GMT -5
thanks for letting me know of erythritol. i like what i was reading about it.
The sugar is mixed with water and fermented with a natural culture. This is essentially the same biological process that produces yogurt/cheese from milk, wine from grapes and soy sauce from soy beans. The result is an all natural granular sweetener, technically classified as a sugar alcohol that has about 70% of the sweetness as sugar and has a zero glycemic index because it does not have an effect on blood sugar levels.
I started off my new batch. I increased the sugar and cocoa butter percentages just a bit keeping them still low BUT added an insane (what is insane?) amount of vanilla (scraped inside of 7 beans plus 1g of vanilla powder). Now after 5hrs in Santha, taste is already divine. I really look forward to trying erythritol next time.
|
|
|
Post by Alan on Jun 23, 2006 5:46:12 GMT -5
Sounds like you're making "vanillocolate"
|
|