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Post by lilypa on Oct 26, 2012 18:19:11 GMT -5
Hey All,
Got any tips for scraping refined chocolate out of the Santha Spectra 11 melangeur as well as off the rollers?
What type of scrapers are you using that seem to be quick and clean? Seems to be very messy currently. I'm using a small silicone scraper.
Scrapping the wheels off is such a pain since they move too. I'd really like to recover (not lose) as much of the refined chocolate as possible.
Cheers All, Dave
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Post by jhoff on Feb 10, 2013 23:13:47 GMT -5
I'd love to hear advice here as well. My other thought - as long as your making the same thing next time - why clean?
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Post by feedme on Feb 12, 2013 1:08:33 GMT -5
umm I don't clean my grinders until I start the next sack, there isn't any point... I use a spatula to get most of it out.
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Post by lilypa on Feb 12, 2013 17:47:38 GMT -5
Not scraping off the rollers makes perfect sense for larger scale operations where you're not changing your recipes at all.
For us smaller scale folks (2 - 5 lbs of "this" and then "that"), we're trying to recover as much as possible right away before we wash/clean the melanguer for the next batch.
Jhoff, one thing that I've found helpful is to minimally scrape chocolate off of the rollers into the drum first. Then I set the rollers aside on a clean plate (still with quite a bit of choco on them). Next, I scrape out the drum as thoroughly as possible. Finally, I put the rollers back in the drum and manually rotate them around the drum so some of the remaining chocolate on the rollers comes off onto the granite base of the drum. I then repeat that process 1-2 more times taking the rollers out then putting them back into the drum with a few manual rotations.
I still just use a couple of silicone scrapers, one large and one small. I was mostly curious if folks out there had a particular scraper in mind that was really efficient at scraping the chocolate out of the drum? My scrapers take many many passes to get the choco out. So, it's a bit tedious.
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Post by Ben on Feb 13, 2013 14:59:33 GMT -5
The cocoatown melangers come with a great tool to help with scraping the rollers. It's a plastic thing that sits at the top of your bowl that you set the rollers on, spinning them to scrape the chocolate off. It's shown at the bottom of this page (labeled 'batter cleaning system'): www.innoconcepts.com/grind+parts.htmWhen I was using a santha, I thought about making something similar (and am now thinking of making something like it for my larger melanger--although it would probably need to be freestanding).
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Post by jhoff on Feb 13, 2013 15:23:19 GMT -5
Thanks both Lilypa and Ben - good ideas.
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gap
Apprentice
Posts: 390
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Post by gap on Feb 13, 2013 18:53:25 GMT -5
Thanks for the link Ben - that's a neat idea
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Post by lilypa on Feb 15, 2013 22:39:23 GMT -5
That's a great idea Ben. Thanks for sharing that link!
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Post by midtown on Mar 3, 2013 0:08:33 GMT -5
I've been pouring 1-2C warm water or milk (cow, almond, soy, whatever) and running the melanger without the tension spring for a few minutes. Use the scraper to really get the water/milk on the sides of the bowl, stones, and such, and you'll end up with a pretty chocolatey liquid that you can easily pour into a mug. Zap it in the microwave for an immediate hot chocolate reward for your efforts, or refrigerate/freeze for a hot chocolate base later. This seems to work pretty well, and I enjoy the outcome Also, I think *not* cleaning would work even for small scale batches, if you don't mind a few ounces of your previous batch influencing your next batch. Even for different beans or flavors, I doubt it would typically make a difference to warrant cleaning everything. What is remaining in the melanger is probably 2-5% of your next batch, so it shouldn't have a strong influence, and any influence it does have wouldn't inherently make it worse, just different.
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Post by lilypa on Mar 3, 2013 1:08:35 GMT -5
How bizarre "midtown", I JUST did that for the first time yesterday. I heated up about 2C of almond milk on the stove and dumped into the melanger. I agree that the outcome was enjoyable.
Yeah...to save my time it may be best just to not clean and wash out the drum and rollers in the future and not worry about influencing one batch with a smidge of flavor from the next.
Thanks for sharing!!
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Post by lilypa on Mar 3, 2013 16:20:13 GMT -5
One important addendum...I heated the almond milk only up to 145F. The granite base will separate from the metal drum of your melanger if exposed to temps, if memory serves me, >165F. That's too hot for the epoxy that holds them together. I'd feel terrible if someone out there had that issue because of my less than informative previous post.
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Post by oakandsage on Mar 4, 2013 14:31:56 GMT -5
I use a silicone spatula of the type you can get for baking. It's very flexible so it gets almost everything out and there's no risk of damage. I have a little trouble scraping off the inner side surface of the wheels.
I started off not cleaning for my first two test batches in the Premier. I stopped the second for a couple hours partway through, and when I started it up again, one of the rollers was siezed up. I think they don't like being left with chocolate on them long enough for some of it to solidify. I had to disassemble the mechanism to get it to run again (which, fortunately, is easy).
It may not be a problem in the Santha. (Heck, for all I know it almost never happens and I just got really unlucky on the second run)
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gap
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Posts: 390
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Post by gap on Mar 4, 2013 16:22:38 GMT -5
oakandsage - when you "disassembled the mechanism", do you mean you took the stone grinders off the central shaft? Was it just a case of unscrewing the nuts on each wheel or were there any tricks to the process?
Thanks
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Post by oakandsage on Mar 5, 2013 11:47:14 GMT -5
Yeah I took the grinding wheels off. No tricks to it. Each one has a nut that unscrews, then it pulls off. There is a washer in between nut and wheel. The one that wasn't stuck slid off easily but I had to pull pretty hard on the stuck one. The wheels have no ball bearings or any complexity, just some lubricant to help them spin freely.
The scraper also unscrews. I knocked mine out of alignment while removing the wheels, and had to adjust it a bit.
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gap
Apprentice
Posts: 390
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Post by gap on Mar 5, 2013 17:12:02 GMT -5
Thanks for that - good to know it's not too tricky
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