lironp

A few questions regarding times/dates: The conference is planned for the 17th and 18th? Is there anything planned for the 16th? During what hours? I am trying to decide whether to fly in on Friday evening or Saturday morning. Also, what should we bring? chocolates for everyone to taste? molds/chocolate/books? Any other equipment?

Booked my room!

Are any of the ladies coming willing to share a room to cut the costs a bit?

Kerry- that sounds like a great idea, I'm so excited to come and finally meet you all!

I'm imagining I'm color blind and that is green :-) Thanks very much for the wishes! I'm going to try my luck working in chocolate for a while and not yucky high-tech!

I love beets! and beet patties The beet filling took some getting used to (I thing it was just a bit on the strong side), but I liked the combination. Another thing they made that I liked was a lemon-Tequilla caramel on top of a dark chocolate salted ganache, that was amazing! I have never tasted an olive oil ganache, sounds interesting- is this from Wybauw's book? Were there any fans? Good luck with the zucchini! :-)

That sounds so familiar... I am never satisfied with what I do (and have the shittiest writing ever!), but I guess most people don't see the things that bother me...

I tasted a beet flavored filling, based on Milk chocolate in She chocolate in New Zealand- the color still came out, but not as bright as with white chocolate (which I actually prefer, and no aftertaste of white chocolate). I tried finding it on their website but I guess they stopped making it... (although I really liked it!)

Looks very elegant, I love the gold!

Finally I can attend!!! My husband and I just moved to North Carolina from Israel, and I would love to join, D.C. is even driving distance from us!

I caramelized cocoa nibs and added them to a dark chocolate bar, it might work with coffee nibs as well...

Thanks everyone for your replies' I'll contact Barry Callebaut to get the list of suppliers. catdaddy- I hope I'll like living there, it's a huge change! In the meantime I've heard a lot of positive things about the area, have you lived there?

My husband and I will be moving from faraway Israel to Durham, North Carolina in about a month, and of course I have quite a few concerns on how to keep on making chocolates... First of all regarding ingredients- I use Callebaut, Cacao Barry and some Valrhona, how can I get them from Durham? In what prices? I usually pay around $8 per kilo, when buying about 50 kilos (hmmm... how do I convert that to pounds?) In Israel there aren't many regulations regarding selling food- as long as you don't have a storefront there's no problem selling in farmers markets and etc. I suppose things are a bit stricter in the US? Do I need a special license in order to be able to sell chocolates in farmers markets? If so, what does that include?

Both these bars look absolutely amazing! I'd prefer a few white spots over a texture that is too tough...

They look amazing!

I made the fresh mint fondant with fresh mint and peppermint oil. I kept them around for a couple of months, to see what would happen- there wasn't any mold or bacteria, but the mint flavor almost completely diminished with time, they just tasted like sugar...

First attempt at using luster dust after reading all this thread I used three different colours- gold, bronze and copper. In one mold, I went over each cavity with some melted cocoa butter, and then sprinkled the luster dust with a small brush, on the other I sprinkled the dust straight on (to see if there was any difference). By the time I got to releasing the chocolates from the molds, I had forgotten which mold was which, but I did see the chocolates from one mold were definitely shinier than the other. By that time I had 2 theories: 1. The shinier ones were from the mold with cocoa butter, and were shinier because of the cocoa butter 2. The opaque ones were from the mold with cocoa butter, and I had put in too much cocoa butter that made them less shiny... hmm... what to do.. finally, after close inspection, I saw that the shiny ones had some thick residues of cocoa butter in some of the corners- yey! no need to do the whole experiment again Anyway here is a picture of the shinier ones- bronze, copper, gold from left to right.

Wow, thanks for the detailed reply! I think I can manage finishing the open bottle in a couple of months, I just thought that if it was bubbly, then I'd have to finish it off in a day We don't have it in Israel, so I wanted to keep it for a special occasion...

I've finally been able to get my hands on a bottle of Marc de Champagne which I intend to use for truffles, but I have one question- I understand that it's a type of brandy, but if so, why does it come with a champagne opening? Is it bubbly or clear? I'm now afraid to open it because I don't know if it will keep... (I don't think I can make enough truffles at once in order to finish the entire bottle...)

Wow cakemuse- these are amazing! I especially like the hearts

Wow, that's unbelievable! Both types look great, but I love the dark ones the most

I bought one chocolate filled with salted caramel mousse from Jean Paul Hevin- amazing taste and texture! I also brought a box of his chocolates home with me and started eating them a week later- all of them were in great shape, except for the the mousse one- the walls had collapsed inside, and it wasn't very airy anymore, so it sounds just like Wybauw's description...

Just got back from a trip to Paris, and of course I visited Jacques Genin's store (as well as about 20 other chocolate stores in Paris). His were some of the best chocolates I ate there, and after hearing so much about the caramels, of course I bought a bunch... Because of the big build up, I was sure they would be disappointing (I can't really say I'm crazy about caramels), but the mango-passion fruit ones were absolutely amazing, one of the best things I've ever tasted... His PDFs were also very good, they had a nice soft texture

I tried making it several times- The first time I did it exactly according to the recipe- Made almond paste and hazelnut paste in my food processor, and tabled it with each type of chocolate. Although it was a cold winter day, the mixture just wouldn't thicken on my marble and the temperature didn't get below 26 degrees- I think the friction between the nut particles keeps it warm. Eventually I moved it to a bowl inside a bowl with ice water and quickly cooled it down to about 22 degrees till it was thick enough. Next time I used ready made praline because I didn't like the texture (instead of 115 gr of hazelnuts and 70 gr icing sugar I used 185 gr of praline)- texture was well after crystallizing, but it was too sweet, and last time Instead of 185 gr praline I used 85 gr unsweetened hazelnut paste, and 100 gr praline. Texture was a bit softer because the unsweetened paste is thinner, maybe it needs to be cooled down more, but the taste was much better this time. What exactly did she have problems with?

You can heat the ganache to about 35 degrees, boil the milk (I use 3%, it doesn't really matter as long as it's not as fatty as cream). I don't divide the ganache into 2, I just add the hot milk in small quantities. Pour some in the middle, then start mixing in very small circles, until the center begins to emulsify. You can then mix in greater circles, if it still gets grainy, or the doesn't emulsify enough,, then add more milk and repeat from the beginning.