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Post by seanppp on Dec 8, 2015 7:26:52 GMT -5
I'm trying to formulate a hot chocolate recipe and have landed on one that uses 2 oz of 70% cocoa chocolate. But I'm wondering if adding a little milk chocolate would be good, too. And it got me to thinking, is 2oz 70% the same as, say, 1oz 50% and 1oz 90%? How does one think about these things when cooking with chocolate and why?
Thanks!
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gap
Apprentice
Posts: 390
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Post by gap on Dec 8, 2015 16:44:31 GMT -5
To simplify, think of a cocoa bean as made up of cocoa butter (fat) and cocoa powder (solids) in a roughly 50/50 split.
So, a 70% chocolate can be made with 70% cocoa beans and it would be roughly 35% (70% x 50%) cocoa butter and 35% (70% x 50%) cocoa powder.
Or, a 70% chocolate can be made with 60% cocoa beans and adding 10% cocoa butter. In which case the chocolate would be roughly 40% cocoa butter (60% x 50% + 10%) and 30% cocoa powder (60% x 50%).
So, the same percentage chocolate can have a very different mix of cocoa butter and cocoa powder making it up. Answering your question above: YES - you can average a 50% and a 90% chocolate to make a 70% chocolate. Will it be the same as your original 70% chocolate? Probably not. Each chocolate is created by its own recipe of beans and additional cocoa butter. But if you like the flavour of your blended 50% and 90%, you can call it a 70%.
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Post by seanppp on Dec 12, 2015 14:40:30 GMT -5
Great. That makes perfect sense. Thanks a lot for the help!
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