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Post by Ben on Jan 11, 2024 10:35:36 GMT -5
The specific bar you link to has chunks of cinnamon rolls included in it. See here: compartes.com/products/cinnamon-roll-holiday-chocolate-giftMy guess is that they still need to be fully dehydrated before being included in the chocolate. I make a speculaas spread using a small stone grinder. I bake the cookies, ensure they're fully dehydrated, and then grind them with refined coconut oil and sunflower oil to make a spread. I've thought about doing this with cocoa butter instead to make a moldable speculaas bar.
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Post by Ben on Jan 11, 2024 10:29:50 GMT -5
I think Chip's answered all the questions. I'd just add that really small batches just make everything more difficult. With small batches, it's hard to make sure that everything gets ground completely as stuff gets stuck to the drum wall, the sides of the stones, the center post, etc. With enough material in the drum, it helps to keep everything flowing. Also, it's hard to maintain a high enough temperature. Lastly, tempering a very small batch is very fiddly and error prone.
Depending on how small you want to go, I'd second the recommendation of looking at the small batch bowl and stones.
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Post by Ben on Jan 1, 2024 23:02:49 GMT -5
In June of 2022, Kelli posted that all of the melangers have been sold.
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Post by Ben on Jan 1, 2024 23:00:32 GMT -5
It looks like it got a little cold to me. My guess is that if you had used a heat gun on it for a couple minutes that it would have warmed up and flowed normally again.
On a side note, while I don't use lecithin myself so can't speak from experience, my understanding is that it is most beneficial to add it right at the end of the grinding process.
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Post by Ben on Jan 1, 2024 22:57:58 GMT -5
If you can get a grinder from Diamond Custom Machines, I'd recommend those over the others. If not, I'd recommend the Spectra over the Santha, but really they'd probably both be fine. If they're marketed as being able to make chocolate, they should be able to run continuously. Regarding conching, stone grinders are not great conches. You can achieve some of the effects of conching in them, but not all. In the original discussion about conching in a stone grinder, Alan (who started the discussion) eventually came to the conclusion that there was no real benefit to releasing the tension. In my experience, I've found this to be true as well. Here's the original conversation: chocolatetalk.proboards.com/thread/315/santha-refining-conching-double-machine
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Post by Ben on Nov 28, 2023 12:22:08 GMT -5
Did that patent say why allulose would need to be conched at that temperature?
When I was making chocolate in small stone grinders, my chocolate would regularly get hotter than that, so it is doable. But I don't think what temperature it hit would have affected the sugar in my case or allulose in this case, since the main process that is happening in a stone grinder is just grinding.
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Post by Ben on Nov 16, 2023 12:34:59 GMT -5
Depending on scale, that's something I can do. Drop me an email at info@potomacchocolate.com and we can discuss.
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Post by Ben on Nov 16, 2023 9:44:04 GMT -5
Yep, Chip's right. Dark chocolate is going to be harder/snappier than milk chocolate or a compound chocolate with a different fat added in. Also, your cocoa butter content seems pretty high--assuming the nibs are around 50% cocoa butter, your cocoa butter content is just under 50% of the whole chocolate. I'd increase the ratio of nibs to butter--maybe try 60% nibs & 10% cocoa butter.
You could also make a compound chocolate by adding a different fat. I make a compound chocolate for chocolate chips in a gelato by mixing a little refined coconut oil into my 70% dark chocolate. Refined coconut oil has been steamed which removes the coconut flavor. You could also use regular coconut oil if you're ok with a little coconut flavor. For this sort of thing, I'd probably start with 3% coconut oil or so and adjust from there.
I've also never used date sugar, so don't know how that would affect things. If it has a high moisture content, it could be causing problems.
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Post by Ben on Nov 13, 2023 12:01:32 GMT -5
Yep, those are bloomed so aren't tempered correctly.
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Post by Ben on Oct 30, 2023 11:18:19 GMT -5
Hello! You'll need to reach out to the agency in your state that regulates this. Here in Virginia, it's the VA Dept of Agriculture and Consumer Services. It could be something similar in your state, or possibly a health department. My understanding, however, is that VA is the only state that lets you have a full-fledged commercial kitchen in your home. But, it's possible that I'm misinformed, or that that has changed since I heard that.
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Post by Ben on Oct 12, 2023 11:45:18 GMT -5
Are these cooled completely at room temperature or do they go into a fridge or cooling cabinet?
My guess is that the bloom is happening on the side where the molds are touching that center piece of wood as the wood is acting as insulation and the heat isn't able to escape from that spot.
Can these molds stand on their own or do they need something in the middle to hold them up? If they can stand on their own, I would suggest placing them on something flat and popping them in the fridge for a few minutes. If they can't stand on their own, I'd replace the wood with something that lets air flow around them and pop them in the fridge for a few minutes.
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Post by Ben on Oct 12, 2023 8:17:30 GMT -5
Hello! Can you provide more information on your tempering and cooling processes? From these photos, my first guess would be a cooling issue. Can you also post a photo of your molds?
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Post by Ben on Oct 10, 2023 8:51:37 GMT -5
You're welcome! 6 hours is probably not going to be long enough for a batch this size. I'd either reduce the batch size or extend the grind. Lecithin would help to reduce the viscosity. I don't use it so I never think to suggest it. There's a lot of discussions about it here in these forums, so you should be able to get a good idea for quantities, when to add it, etc.
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Post by Ben on Oct 9, 2023 11:07:04 GMT -5
I make a hazelnut chocolate spread with just hazelnuts and chocolate (cacao, sugar, cocoa butter). It works great. I just refine hazelnuts in a stone grinder and then mix them with the melted chocolate. It needs to be 'tempered' sorta, by cooling it down to about 80F before pouring into jars. Otherwise the cocoa butter tends to separate a bit and form little solid bits. They're not really a problem if you're going to be spreading this on something warm as they'll just melt, but they're ugly and if you can feel them if you just eat a spoonful of it.
Since the spreadability comes from the fat in the hazelnuts, you'll need to have a pretty high ratio of hazelnut to chocolate. Pretty easy to mess around with to figure out your ideal ratio.
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Post by Ben on Oct 9, 2023 11:01:21 GMT -5
There's a lot going on here. I'll try to answer some of the questions and provide some suggestions. First, how much does 3 cups of date powder and 3 cups of almond protein weigh? It's difficult to know what your actual formulation is without the weights. I would highly recommend measuring only using weight. Also, how long did you refine this for? Viscosity of chocolate is essentially determined by the ratio of cocoa butter to solids. Your current formulation almost certainly doesn't have enough cocoa butter to produce the viscosity you're looking for. Basically, there's too many solids and not enough fat. If you don't want to add cocoa butter, the only other option is to add more nibs relative to the other ingredients. This will make a stronger/darker chocolate, however. Note that sugar doesn't melt or dissolve in chocolate since chocolate is fat-based and has no water. So, the sugar is refined by being crushed by the stones. Date sugar will also be refined by the stones, so just having date sugar won't necessarily make your chocolate thicker than if you had used regular sugar. I'm assuming that what you mean when you say that your formulation made a 'dark' chocolate is that the chocolate was stronger or darker than you had hoped, and that you're trying to make something sweeter and lighter. This again, is due to formulation. To make something sweeter and/or lighter, you need to add more of the sweetener and/or milk alternative. The problem with this, of course, is that your chocolate is already too thick with your current formulation. Essentially, you've got to decide which compromise you're willing to make. Either you can have a darker chocolate with a lower viscosity, a lighter chocolate with a thicker viscosity, or a chocolate with added cocoa butter. My guess is that added cocoa butter isn't really the problem as much as too much cocoa butter overall. So, you could probably lower the amount of nibs and add some cocoa butter to get a lighter and less viscous chocolate. You could try your monkfruit idea, but it's going to have the same issues as your current chocolate unless you somehow adjust the fat to solids ratio. Hope this helps!
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