Chocolot

I think you need it to be firm to cut. If the ganache is soft, the nuts will drag, not cut. IMHO.

That ratio will be pretty soft. I usually go 2.5 to 1 on milk chocolate. I would think the nuts would just squish through the ganache if soft. Also, tighten your wires if you are afraid of breaking. I like them to all play the same note, but I'm strange that way:)

Kerry, Was the chocolate liquid when you put it in the ez? Liquid and in temper, or solid and in temper?

I use thermometers from Thermoworks, either their handheld thermocouple or Thermapen and haven't had a problem.

Sounds like a good pan. I will be at Disneyland from October 12-19. Other than that time, you will be welcome.

Willow, you are welcome any time! I have three Savage 50# semi-auto tempering machines and I won't be getting rid of them, but the EZ is really amazing. Tuesday, I had 50 molds to back. I had set my melters to about 5 degrees over ideal to hold over night. Next morning, I thought (wrongly) that if I lowered the temp and turned on the agitation, that by the time I was ready, the chocolate would be in good enough temper to back the shells. I tested and it was not ready. The temp was ok, but the choc was spotty. I opened up my trusty EZ, and not knowing how much chocolate I had in each machines, I guessed. I mixed the silk with some of the chocolate then poured into the machine. I did this for both dark and milk. By the time I had cleaned up the bowls, I retested, and both were perfect! I backed over 900 pieces in less than an hour. While my photo is less than stellar, you can see that the top one in milk choc is spotty, second one ok. Second set is dark, and you can possibly see that the first one is spotty, but not the next one. These were taken less than 3 minutes after adding silk. I had about 20# of choc in each melter. Come on down and we will get Casino Cassidy and Romina to come play.

I see some wonderful Beehive Cheese:)

Hey Cowboy, The CB was totally melted and then allowed to set up. When it was in the EZ, it was very soft, but worked. What do you think is going on?

Kerry asked me to experiment, so I did. Each sample is from the same block of cocoa butter. The red spatula is from cb that has been in the EZ for several weeks, blue is from tempered cb that I did a few days ago, green is from untempered cb from a few days ago.I poured the cb into glass jars and allowed them to set up. Yesterday, I put a jar of each tempered and non tempered cb in the EZ. Stirred them once last night and again this morning. I measured the chocolate and put the same amount of silk in each one at the same temp. This only took a few minutes. Stirred a few times and spread out. I can't tell any difference between the cb's. Untempered did as well as tempered. Interesting that the spatulas still have areas where the seeded chocolate didn't get. Shows dramatically the difference between tempered and non tempered chocolate. From this very unscientific experiment, I don't think the EZ cares what shape the cocoa butter is in. Tempered or non tempered was the same.

Do you want me to put them in now, or wait a few weeks?

Todays fun was with old cocoa butter. Kerry got me thinking. I bought 55lb of cocoa butter at a very good price, but it was several years old. It was all in one block and I had to chip off what I needed. I hammered off about 10 lbs and put it in a black bucket with a lid and paced it outside in the hot sun. Periodically, I poured off what was melted. It was 98F when I started to play. I cooled down to 93, added 2% EZ temper silk and stirred until 91F. Poured into old jelly jars. After about 5 minutes, put in fridge. Second batch, before I seeded, I poured one jar without any silk. I really didn't think there would be much difference, but as usual, I was wrong. The jar that wasn't seeded, set up, but as you can see, it did not contract away from the jar, and is mottled. The jars that were seeded with silk, are in beautiful temper and will even slide out of the jar. My plan is to just put the jar of CB in the EZ temper and leave it for a day or two. I think it will be an easy way to get silk.

Since the kids and grandkids will be over tomorrow, I decided I needed some treats for them. I've been playing with the Eztemper, but mostly with dark chocolate. Today, I made some crackle bar by adding Rice Krispies to milk chocolate. It only took 15 minutes from 100F degree chocolate to finished bars. The Eztemper silk is a beautiful thing. Less than 5 minutes later Finished 15 minutes total!!

The reason you can find glaze and not polish, is all about shelf life. The glazes last forever (almost), while the polish is only good for a few weeks or months. Get some samples, because you can't buy in small quantities. Store in refrigerator.

Where can I get an inverter for the car?

No, they don't need a precoat. They do tend to stick together, so you have to keep them separated. Jean Marie had us roll some fruits into balls so they coat more evenly. Have fun!

It is really just that easy. Every time I use it, I get ready for a fail. Just the pessimist in me, I guess. It just seems so unbelievably easy!! You still need to melt out any bad crystals, but then you can walk away and wait for the temp to drop. Since you are working a few degrees above the "normal" temps, you have that much more time to work with the chocolate. You will still have to warm it up occasionally, but it seems to last longer. I think Kerry suggests you add more warm, untempered chocolate to warm it up. With the ugly mess I played with yesterday, (above) I really thought I would have some problems. Nope, just followed the same plan. Just stirred in the silk, waited a minute and poured into the pan. Easy!!

So, a few weeks ago I cleaned out the pan on my enrober. It has been some time since I did this. There was a thick goo of chocolate that I scraped out. Not wanting to waste this, I decided to try to salvage it. I heated it up to over 120F. Stirred and stirred. It was thick, so added some melted cocoa butter. I got the temp down to 93F, added 1% silk from EZtemper, stirred a few times and poured out. I am more than happy with the results. Considering the volume (2300 grams) and the latent heat, I thought it turned out great. I can now use it for ganaches. I just can't believe what the silk does. I have seen it many times, but I'm always surprised when it actually tempers the chocolate so easily. Thanks Kerry!!!

What you have made is a gianduja. It will always harden. Try making a ganache and adding peanut butter.

So did you have to do anything but shake the bottle? Just put in the EZ and walked away?

Yes, I used water--about half way up. I didn't think to use a rack:) The color is a little darker that the real stuff. I added about 200 g of cocoa butter besides the silk. I think it was too much. I think using clarified butter instead would have been better. Mine is snappier than Dulcey. The butter would make it a bit softer. The flavor is similar, but not as salty. I plan to use it in ganache, so it probably will be ok.

I posted on Confections! What did we make? (2014 – ) about my experience making dulcey with EZtemper silk. ​I'll post a few teaser photos here. So thick, I thought I had killed it. Thinned out as it cooled. Added silk and stirred. Tests before and after silk Finished bars. I am really enjoying using the EZtemper silk. It has made making things so much faster!!

Yesterday I decided to make my version of dulcey in a pressure cooker. I sealed 1000 g white chocolate in Food Saver bag and cooked on hi for 90 minutes. I thought I had ruined the chocolate but kept stirring. It thinned out as it cooled. Added EZtemper silk and stirred. Here are the two tests for temper. First one was untempered. Second one was after stirring in silk. Molded dulcey. Finished bars. I only molded them to have the dulcey in a breakup form. The cocoa butter in the EZtemper is nothing short of amazing!

Wouldn't miss it.

Had more fun today with the EZtemper. I had to get out an order for 400 Blackberry Cheesecake bon bons. I needed to fill and close today for an event tomorrow. I made 2100 gms of ganache. Added 21 gms silk Gave it a whirl Piped a very fluid ganache Closed and popped out in under 2 hours. This was very fluid because I didn't need a long shelf life. Normally I would need to leave overnight to be able to close. Within an hour, it was set enough to close. It wasn't totally setup, but enough. Part of the appeal is that the cb is always ready. You don't need to mess with a bag in water, or worry about having enough ready to go. It is very simple to scoop out what you need and put back until the next batch. it takes very little electricity, so I will leave it on all the time. The cb is so close the the temp you need, that by leaving it out at room temp for even a minute will cause it to firm up.

I have used Mycryo and while it is a tool, it is nothing like the Eztemper. As you say, it is difficult to mix in. I found the EZ really great to use because as I was making each ganache, I put the container back in the unit, and would remove as I needed it. On the last frame, I didn't measure the cb, just guessed. In a ganache, I don't think the % is as critical as in plain chocolate. I have just left the unit on and will as long as I think I'll be working with chocolate--which seems to be all the time:) It comes with two SS containers to hold the cb. When I finished up today, I combined the two containers and filled the empty one with more cb so it will be ready whenever I need it.