gap
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Post by gap on Nov 21, 2010 16:18:47 GMT -5
Well put Sebastian
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gap
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Post by gap on Nov 20, 2010 2:52:30 GMT -5
I haven't done solid bars before, so I'm guessing a bit based on experience of show-pieces. By the looks of your mark, the outside if cooling at the correct rate, but it's taking too long to cool the interior of the mould, which means the chocolate isn't releasing correctly. Try putting it in the fridge to cool. I do this for some of the large solid discs I do or large Easter eggs and it works well when you have a large area of chocolate you need to cool.
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gap
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Post by gap on Nov 15, 2010 23:58:29 GMT -5
I hit everything with a heat gun (paint stripper) and scrape all the chocolate off onto baking paper to keep for next time. Minimum chocolate down the sink.
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gap
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Post by gap on Nov 15, 2010 23:56:13 GMT -5
FWIW, melting on the stove in a pot can be dangerous as the chocolate may keep heating in a hot saucepan even once it is off the stove. Try using a microwave to melt. If you have 1kg of chocolate to melt, start by using 30 seconds to melt and stir inbetween each melt. When it starts to go (bits are sticking together, you are starting to see some melting) then reduce it to 15 seconds. When it gets close to melting out all the bits of chocolate, just use 5 second intervals. Alternatively, if you do want to melt on a stove, trasfer the chocolate to a new container once it has melted so you know it wont keep heating up.
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gap
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Post by gap on Nov 15, 2010 16:38:57 GMT -5
Yep, I can see how that would become important quite quickly as your production increases
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gap
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Post by gap on Nov 15, 2010 16:35:17 GMT -5
I agree with Brad's comments - you don't want to melt all of your seed chocolate too quickly. If you need to speed up the process a bit because the seed chocolate isn't melting at the lower temperature, hit the whole thing with an immersion blender for a while.
Pre-crystallsing chocolate (ie., tempering it) is about three things - time, temperature and movement. Don't just concentrate on the temperature, remember that tempering also takes time to happen (for the correct crystals to multiply) and requires movement of the chocolate (agitation on a table or stirring in a bowl) to happen. I was taught to temper chocolate from day one without a thermometer and I still don't use one today - although temperature is important, it isn't the only thing.
Also, for what its worth, I always melt my chocolate to 45C before starting, so I think you would have been fine with that.
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gap
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Post by gap on Nov 14, 2010 16:11:07 GMT -5
Yep, I saw the answer on another board as well - I can see my answer was a long way from what was actually being asked (although reading your and Tony's back and forth, I still don't know what was being asked or answered :-)
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gap
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Post by gap on Nov 13, 2010 22:28:57 GMT -5
Your use of the word specific means my answer might not be much help, but I generally melt all my chocolate at 45C - 50C. I try not to ever take it over that, but I don't know what the exact maximum is before it starts . . . burning I guess
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gap
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Post by gap on Nov 9, 2010 0:47:37 GMT -5
Well done Brad - I wish you the best of luck
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gap
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Post by gap on Oct 19, 2010 18:16:33 GMT -5
Hi,
on the tempering: usually couverture has the viscousity on the packaging
on airbrushing: I haven't heard of any lacquers to get the shiny finish you're after. A shiny finish occurs because the cocoa butter in the chocolate or spray is setting against the shiny/smooth mould.
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gap
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Post by gap on Aug 9, 2010 17:42:27 GMT -5
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gap
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Post by gap on Jun 1, 2010 20:26:50 GMT -5
Depends what you are doing and in what volumes.
I use melters when I make my chocolates (ie., soft centered chocolates, not solid bars). I temper the chocolate by hand on marble and then put it back into the melting unit to hold its temper. With practice, it takes about 15-20 minutes to temper.
The temper of the chocolate is something you just learn to keep on top of. Brad mentions above that agitation is important, which is accomplished by stirring the chocolate as you work. Also important is adding the occasional bout of heat from a heat gun (eg., paint stripper) to prevent over-crystallisation/temper. It's not hard and it's just something you do.
The trade-off is a much cheaper unit. I use 6kg mold-art units which provide enough surface area to use standard chocolate moulds. A tempering unit with that surface area would be way out of my budget. Also, I can run 2-3 different melting units with different types of chocolaltes which again is cheaper than 2-3 tempering machines.
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gap
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Post by gap on Mar 3, 2010 16:04:16 GMT -5
Just to give another side of the coin - I had a good experience buying moulds from Chocolat Chocolat
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Post by gap on Feb 23, 2010 18:20:46 GMT -5
Hi, maybe I can point you in the right direction for a few things: 1. What you may be thinking of are called sugar-crusted liqueurs. If you do a search on making them (ie., google) or search for making them on eG Forums Pastry and Baking Section (http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?/forum/72-pastry-baking/) you will find some information. Also, good chocolate making books will have that sort of information. Generally the sugar crusted liqueurs are quite a tricky process and require some precision in your kitchem A better option is often to make the liqueur/sugar syrup solution and deposit into pre-made sphericle chocolate shells, let the syrup crust over and the pipe some chocolate on top. Gneerally this is something easy to do once you've seen it done but is hard to learn from a book or the net. 2. Can't help with the chocolate making machine, but you will need to temper chocolate to use it. You can buy a machine if you are doing large batches to temper your chocolate but you can also temper chocolate by hand. 3. Not that I know of for making chocolate itself (ie., from bean to bar). If you are after a good book about making chocolate confections (ie., truffles, ganache centres, caramels, liqueur centres, fudge, marshmallow etc etc etc) you could probably try www.amazon.com/Chocolates-Confections-Formula-Technique-Confectioner/dp/07645884434. You will need air conditioning and some sort of humidity control. Others around these boards know the exact numbers better than I, but generally tempering becomes troublesome for me once my kitchen temp gets to 24 degrees and high humidity can also cause issues. Hope that can get you started.
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gap
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Post by gap on Feb 10, 2010 16:27:37 GMT -5
Unfortunately I can't really add anything on the NZ chocolate scene . . .
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