Thank you both for your replies. I took your advice and made sure that the couverature set more quickly after I dipped the caramels. And that did solve my problem with the tops of the chocoaltes blooming. Apparently the chocolate was in fact too cold and was setting slow enough to cause blooming. I think that I was overly cautious about heating the chocoalte too high thus loosing my temper, and I did not quite get it hot enough. I made sure that this time I was right at 91/92. I just attended a class with Werner Hitz on candy making (it was a great class) and we did not really get clear direction on how to handle blooming. Thanks Steve for explaining what causes blooming so clearly. Very good advice. Christa