keychris

more faffing about = more $$$ cost to the client in my humble opinion

I've used one for baguettes for ... about a decade and haven't washed it once. I keep it in a ziploc bag to stop moths getting on it and that's it.

I would definitely blitz everything as fine as you can before you put it in the grinder!

if your gelatin smells terrible, you're using the wrong one the leaf gelatin I use has next to no odour at all.

remembering that UV is only going to surface sterilise, the bulk of a ganache that contains any microbes is either already sealed in the chocolate or just ... below the surface of the ganache when you're irradiating, I'm not sure how useful UV irradiation will be.

Juan at heart?

you're getting fat migration because the chocolate is physically squeezing the filling as it sets and contracts, forcing the fat out. If you can't change your formulation, you could try adding something like a layer of crushed peanuts to the outside of the ball, then dip. The nuts will provide a layer that can be squeezed a bit (because there's air in between all the nuts) and you shouldn't see the fat come out. It should also help with your base too (in theory).

I saw this technique as well. How do you get rid of the water??

if you're looking at an EZtemper, you could just get that and melting tanks. The EZtemper will take care of your tempering and you won't need a machine for it. if you don't mind me asking, what's the reason behind only lindt? Prefer the taste? Price / availability? IMHO there's a lot of better couverture than lindt out there, but if it meets your needs then no worries

hah, I hear you. I have burns on my bench, my floor, other electrical cords, my self... come to think of it, maybe I shouldn't be using one

The pedant scientist in me needs to point out that the symbol that's been used there in the bottom left cell is > which is "greater than". They mean < (less than). Obviously.

releasing is dictated by the contraction of the chocolate, so you need to look at either the temper of the chocolate, because if it's not properly tempered it won't contract fully, or the thickness of the shell, if it's too thin it doesn't have the "strength" to contract away from the surface. If you feel the temper was fine, putting it into the freezer for 20 minutes should help it out.

to prevent it from happening, you probably need to mold, fill and cap before the shell has contracted away from the mold. This can lead to cracking if the shell and base contract at different rates or shelf life issues if the filling needed to evaporate some moisture off. If you have an Eztemper, this would help because your filling will crystallise faster and therefore be ready to cap faster

I'm another "don't bother to heat your moulds" vote.

guitar sheet is exactly what I meant to write when I put acetate in there 🙄

acetate or transfer sheet.

I personally wouldn't be able to get shells that thin with overcrystallised chocolate, it's like sludge

the big automatic tempering machines like a Selmi hold the chocolate in the tank at 45C (or whatever you set it at). The chocolate that comes out the spout has been cooled to 32C (or whatever you set it to) and it's perfectly tempered (or should be). But once it's back in the big tank, it's back up to 45C and uncrystallised. So you can *get* tempered chocolate whenever you need it, but it's not held in temper all the time.

measuring the "tempering quality" of the chocolate is as simple as sticking a spatula in and testing the temper. If you mean, are they monitoring the level of crystallisation, no, I don't believe so. it's done by knowledge of how the cocoa butter crystallises, using temperature and movement to generate the correct crystals. that being said I don't actually have one so I could be completely wrong

if your authorities are anything like ours, they won't have a template, and they won't have any idea on how you should produce the SOP. Trying to get assistance with labelling regulations that my health authorities wanted me to comply with was like getting blood from a stone!

practice. lots of it.

Melisa Coppel actually uses that as a technique to make one of her designs iirc

cheers Jimbo. UNfortunately looks like allulose isn't approved for use in foods in Australia at the moment... I'll have a search on here for those other topics

Hi all, Does anyone have experience with making a bean to bar using a sweetener other than sugar? Not sure I want to jump in and waste my beans if the road has been troden and found to be a mud track to nowhere... If you've had success, can you share so I can copy you shamelessly Chris

The first sentence says that you don't temper then the second sentence says you do 😛