AnnieWilliams

Oh ok, so they are "time sensitive?" I wonder if they could be frozen. I was kind of hoping they would be ok for a couple of weeks at least. Shows you how ignorant I am to the world of chocolate truffles, haha!

Ok, do you ever enrobe with chocolate that isn't tempered? What if you didn't enrobe at all? Would they be ok at room temperature or should they be refrigerated? Sorry, I don't have much experience with this!

Not sure actually. Would you keep them refrigerated?

Do you enrobe these with tempered chocolate or just roll them in cocoa powder?

Wow, you are just awesome!

I was asked to make some chocolate truffles, which I have never done before since I'm not much of a candy maker. Sure, I have made ganache, but I have never gotten into the whole truffle thing. I am not looking at using molds, just the irregular chocolate "blobs" rolled in cocoa powder or whatever else. I was wondering if someone could provide a good base formula for the ganache. I am not sure what percentage of chocolate to use (I have been making ganache with 70% lately and it's been good), whether or not to add butter, and how much liqueur to use if you wanted to flavor them that way. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

That looks wonderful!

Bummer! I am sorry that happened to you. I think it was definitely the filling. I made four over the weekend and I used a French buttercream to fill. For one, I did a vanilla bean rum version, and I ended up putting too much rum in (oops) so it was a little softer than I would have liked. Anyway, the best thing I have found is to fill it, then refrigerate it for at least 20 minutes to let things firm up again. Your white chocolate cream cheese icing should have firmed up in the fridge with no problem. Then it's really easy to move it and ice it. It sounds delicious though!

Wow, now I feel really stupid. Thanks Kerry!

That's a good point about the fruit powder. I thought about using them before with macarons, but they are expensive. So my math skills suck. What would be 10% sugar in a puree?

Thanks again so much! If I don't have any Boiron purees, do you think I could substitute homemade? Also, in the Flavor Enhancer column, how much of that particular ingredient do you add? Thanks again!

Thanks guys. I have never tired any of the Boiron purees but I have been curious for a long time now. I appreciate the help!

I have only made vanilla and chocolate pastry cream, but I would like to expand into fruit flavors. What's the best way to do it? Replace all or part of the cream or milk with fruit puree, or just add the puree at the end of cooking? I really want a good, strong flavor. Thanks!

Thank you both so much for your help!

Does anyone make ganache (for icing cakes) with 85% chocolate? I picked up two bars yesterday, one 85% and the other 70%, and there was a huge difference in taste between the two. The 85% definitely had a deeper, more complex flavor, but it was obviously quite bitter. I'm on the fence about whether to use it straight and add a small amount of sugar, or to use a combo of the 70 and 85. Thanks for your help!

Do you think it could have been a chiboust? Maybe it was coconut pastry cream with meringue mixed in. Here are a couple of links: http://www.joepastry.com/2011/making-chiboust/ http://pastrychefonline.com/2007/05/04/chiboust-cream/ This chocolate dessert looks pretty mousse-y. http://www.chefeddy.com/2010/07/creme-chiboust/ It sounds like it left quite an impression! Let us know how your experiments turn out!

Thanks so much Frog! I really appreciate it.

Hi friends, I was wondering if you could take a look at the following video, and tell me what they are putting on top of these eclairs. It's at 4:50. It looks like some kind of chocolate with caramel, but I can't be sure. Any tips, ideas, or recipes would be appreciated! Thanks!

I have looked at Chocosphere and they seem to have decent prices, and they have a lot of brands from which to choose.

Wow that's impressive! I would love to see how everyone works on such a large project. I envision total mayhem but then again to get so much accomplished there is probably some semblance of organization! Thanks again for the tips!

Thank you James for your reply. I had a feeling that the French buttercream was the same, I was just thinking that it would have the same richness as the pastry cream and maybe more flavor from the yolks. I agree about eating pastry cream over buttercream, but then there are those strange people who hate pastry cream. My initial idea was to go with a pastry cream or mousseline, so thanks for that vote. I do work full time and ideally I would like to freeze as much as possible (only for a week or so) so I would have to work some things out logistically if I decided to make the pastry cream. Really I don't even know how many buches I'm going to make yet, so it could be very doable. Thanks again for your help, James!

I definitely agree with you about the richness factor. I actually saw several recipes where a mousseline was made by whipping butter into pastry cream. I guess I can always do some experimenting to see which tastes better. Wow that one mold is neat! That is for some serious buche making. Thanks so much for posting the links to the molds. I am definitely going to look into those, as they seem to be more interesting than anything homely I could make.

Thank you Diana! I'm almost positive you can use that biscuit recipe for some cake origami (cakigami?). It's very durable and flexible. That is a great link you posted. I really love the way those look when cut. I don't have a buche mold so I just roll mine. Where do you find your molds? It's good to know that the buche is supposed to be "mostly soft." I was thinking I had too much buttercream in the filling. It was Italian meringue so it wasn't the typical crunchy buttercream made with butter and confectioner's sugar. Have you made French buttercream? In that previous buche thread that Heidi linked to, it looks like one of the posters was mixing praline paste in with French buttercream and she said she liked the way it tasted. I'm not sure how close in texture French buttercream is to pastry cream, I imagine pastry cream is a bit thicker, but I think the richness of the yolks would add a lot to the flavor. I liked using the ganache to ice. I thought it was nice and rich and I loved the deep color. I don't think I would like using buttercream as much for the icing.

Thank you all for your replies. Thanks Heidi for the link. I had that one bookmarked from a while back and it does have some good info. Diana, here is the recipe I used. http://www.joyofbaki...eorBiscuit.html Like I said, it is a great recipe to work with. I just was hoping to have something a little thicker, and a tried and true chocolate recipe for a 12x17 would be great. Also, if anyone has any good filling suggestions or a preferred icing they use for their buches I would be interested in that as well. Thanks again for your replies. I am open to any additional suggestions.

Hi Coreen, For writing on chocolate, you can hand-paint the chocolate using colored cocoa butter, or pipe it on if you are good at that. There are even letter stamps you can buy at craft stores which are really small. Look in the clay/modeling section. Royal icing should last a while if you keep it out of humid environments. The thing you have to watch is putting it on or near anything where there is oil or grease. Royal icing will break down on buttercream. I think as long as you keep both mediums stored away from light and humidity, you are safe to make some up ahead of time and have them ready for your customers. Annie