Jim D.

@Louise nadine brill: Once you get your chocolate space set up, I hope you will report on your experience with the LVLP gun. I have not read anything from those who work with chocolate and who use this type of gun, and I, for one, would be very interested in learning more. I have seen that it is the gun to use with lower-HP compressors. The videos comparing LVLP with HVLP are, of course, dealing with paint, and it's not always clear how this translates to cocoa butter. Have you ever used an HVLP gun? It would be great to have a comparison from a chocolatier.

I would say that depends on what you plan to use it for. At 1.5 HP it should handle an airbrush, but not an HVLP gun. If you are considering purchasing with an eye toward future needs (a constant theme with confectioners--considering the numerous eGullet mentions of equipment we all have that we have "outgrown"), I would try to get a more powerful one. As I wrote recently, my 2 HP compressor does not run a mini-HVLP gun satisfactorily. If I were doing it over, I would get at least a 3 HP, perhaps even more. You may be using an airbrush now, but are you completely certain your production will never rise to the point at which you will need to switch to a gun?

The higher number is when using their so-called "holey" baffle, which allows some chocolate to flow through the baffle, so the whole bowl can be filled. I have never used it, and it strikes me that the level of chocolate in the front section (where one dips a ladle) would reach a lower level sooner, but I don't know that for a fact.

I know I am in a minority on eGullet, but I use a tempering machine, specifically the Chocovision Delta. It can temper up to 7.7kg at a time and as little as 1.4Kg (which comes in handy when you are not making a lot of chocolates at a time). It can handle more than the stated maximum if you have additional chocolate melted and ready to add to the bowl. Its advantage to me is that I premelt the chocolate overnight, pour it in, set the control, and can do other things while the machine does its job, raising the temp to the desired highest point, then down to the lowest point for tempering, then up to the working temp. Its thermostat keeps the chocolate in temper for a long time (with, of course, the usual adjustments needed to deal with overtempering). The biggest downside is its cost, which is $2,329 (though it can be found for a little less than that). That's a lot more than the Mol d'art, but it also does a lot more. Another downside is that dumping chocolate out of molds requires considerably more attention than is needed when using a melter, simply because the Delta bowl is round, whereas the Mol d'art container is rectangular.

I recommend calling Paasche directly. I had very good experience with their customer support.

That's a very good idea, especially because I have had that happen! Fortunately I discovered it before the chocolates went to others. It tends to occur especially when I have to trim the bag a second time, and the trimming is very small. Another cause is when a ganache is crystallizing at lightning speed, and I rush to get it into the cavities. In her videos KIrsten Tibballs makes a point of warning about this issue.

@pastrygirl, that is a small seam. Thanks.

Thanks, that's a great idea. I will start practicing. I guess I assumed the points were just a fact of piping life. I love fillings that are "self-leveling," but those are few and far between.

I use piping bags for depositing ganaches in chocolate shells and am looking for a better bag. I assume there has to be a seam of some sort in the manufacture of the bags, but sometimes the seam is so pronounced that the opening becomes an oval that cannot be made round. Working in very small quarters (such as the nooks and crannies of a mold) can make a round opening quite desirable. I have used Thermohauser (a pronounced seam) and Kee-seal (better). I saw recommendations for Hygo, which advertises "no flange seam," but I've never seen one in person. In her videos pastry chef Kirsten Tibballs appears to be using a bag that has a truly round opening, but I cannot be sure. I know this perhaps seems an odd quest, and I can certainly carry on with what I am currently using, but if what I want exists, I would like to find it, and I am at the point where I need to reorder bags. Do those who work in chocolate have favorite piping bags?

Yes, I melt in a dehydrator, and there is some separation, but a stir solves that. I don't generally melt white chocolate this way, however, because it just looks too terrible when melted, even though I know it's probably OK. But I'm not using so much of it in making shells that a microwave doesn't do the trick fairly quickly.

@Merry Berry, Far from being offended, I am very appreciative of all the effort you put into responding to my questions and concerns. I will certainly check out the attachments. A couple of things make my situation different from yours: You are in Chattanooga (pop. 179,000); I am in Staunton (about 23,000). I imagine you have a more affluent potential clientele, certainly a larger pool from which they can come. Although I lived in Boston for most of my adult life, I grew up here and know it (and potential customer base) well. To make chocolate matters worse, there is one of the largest Hershey's plants in the U.S. just outside Staunton, and to most Stauntonians, that represents chocolate (this one specializes in Reese's Cups, definitely a crowd-pleaser). I interviewed to sell gift boxes for VIP guests at a new hotel in town. The manager agreed the chocolates were attractive and tasted good, but what they were thinking of was...[after a slight pause] more along the lines of Hershey's milk chocolate. And he actually was bold enough to try to negotiate the per-piece price of $1 downward. That's Staunton (and probably most small cities and towns). You are quite right that I am torn about raising the prices. Or, more accurately, I was torn, since this morning I went ahead and announced an increase to $1.50 per piece (I am not willing to go higher, even though I know $2 is the going price at most places). So far the reaction has been orders placed as usual with no comment about the prices or, in several cases, reactions like "hey, quality costs" or "it's about time you took this step." No negative reaction, but of course those who can't or won't afford it just won't order. I am also going to raise wholesale prices--that will take even more courage since these places are used to making huge profits from the chocolates. About the boxing: Believe me, I spent a summer researching packaging. Many of my bonbons are larger than typical ones, and I like them that way (besides, I am not about to start collecting molds all over again). Their size means I need trays with cavities 1 1/2" square and boxes at least 1 1/2" high. That means custom boxes. Places like Nashville Wraps, U.S. Box, Papermart, A Specialty Box, etc., have nothing that would work. I don't have storage space for large quantities of boxes. That means higher prices per box. Those are simple facts. Since I began as a hobbyist (self-taught, no professional training, but--I should definitely add--eGullet-trained), I never needed to calculate the hidden costs of doing business (electricity, gas, water), nor any allowance for labor or profit. Frankly I have no idea of how to do that with any accuracy (how much money I spend on the kitchen lights used for making chocolates vs. how much I spend to have them on when I am cooking my dinner). I have calculated the cost of every flavor of bonbon I make and of packaging, and I know that combined cost averages around $1 (ingredients like pistachio paste raise that cost rather quickly!). I am simply not bold enough to set my pricing based on the luxury status of my product. Filing taxes as a business requires having made a profit for something like 3 of the past 5 years. With all my expenses, I cannot, in all honesty, state that to be true, and I am not willing to be audited by the IRS. Thanks again for your advice.

The boxes are expensive. In the initial order of the 30-piece size they were $2.40 each! That was for 500 (they are large--10" x 10" x 1.5"). Of course they would have been substantially lower in price if I had ordered more. But I have just my basement for storage and had to spend a lot of time this week determining where the next order of 500 will go. The catch is that the place I ordered them was the only one I could find after much searching that would manufacture such a small order. Their prices were on the low side, but it turns out (surprise!) that you get what you pay for. I am finding severely damaged boxes in the cartons, and they had terrible customer service (they kept telling me the order was coming any day, then it became obvious they were moving my order to the back of the queue in favor of larger Christmas orders). So I am switching to another place I have since found that will do small runs, but it's going to cost even more. And I must confess that whereas I love the boxes I have, no customer would be willing to pay $2.40 for the box. Just to demonstrate how people are around here (probably other places as well), many regular customers return the empty boxes for reuse.

You are certainly right about the changing landscape in Staunton (oldtimers are alarmed at how fast this is happening--getting too "artsy"). It's acquiring a bit of an Asheville, N.C., vibe with a resident Shakespeare theater and numerous music festivals, not to mention the glass blowing place with which you are familiar). Some of those people are making up my newer customer list. Yes, The Shack gets customers (and reviews) from D.C.; it can be difficult to get a table now. Zynodoa, a restaurant with "inspired Southern cuisine," is also drawing crowds, has a new chef who worked at one of Thomas Keller's places (my chocolates are on the menu there). I am really intrigued by your lagniappe idea. I already give the "trimmings" from slabs cut on the guitar to some of my closest friends, and though I was embarrassed to offer this at first, I discovered they love it, I guess it's the idea of a freebie (a manager at Zynodoa now looks for the trimmings packet to arrive). And I do sometimes have leftover or slightly damaged bonbons that could be packaged as you suggest.

Thanks for your ideas. As you are a fellow Virginian and somewhat familiar with Staunton, you probably know a bit about the customer base. I think $1.50/piece is about the most that will fly. It will certainly come closer to covering what was lost with the tax change. The question is whether moving all at once or gradually is preferable. I should have added to what I originally wrote that I don't think I will be disturbed if I lose some customers (maybe my ego bruised a little). I have about all the sales I can handle now and fully expect the number to increase at holiday time this year. I am too old to think of hiring help and growing the business dramatically. Many of the customers are my friends, though, and that makes raising prices all the more difficult.

Although I have been a business making chocolates for several years, I have never actually dealt with pricing in a serious way. After retiring in 2011, I began making bonbons as a hobby, giving them away at first, then when people asked to buy them, pricing them about at cost. I did not have any confidence that customers would pay more than that, particularly since I live in an area of the U.S. where people tend to be frugal with how they spend their money. Gradually as I discovered eGullet and learned more about chocolate, I drifted toward higher-end ingredients (I use Felchlin and Valrhona couvertures), but I kept the prices at about $1 per piece, plus a dollar or so for packaging, so a box of 6 bonbons was priced (and still is) at $8. I didn't really think too much about the cost of equipment (a tempering machine, a guitar, an Aw meter) because I still saw what I did as a hobby and did not depend on it for living expenses (I did not include anything in the cost for my labor or for utilities). From a tax perspective, I filed as a hobbyist because I could not meet the requirement that I show I had made a profit for several years. Some people who had traveled and had tasted "gourmet" chocolates in other places told me I was undervaluing my product, and I could see from chocolates I bought (Kate Weiser's, for instance) that mine were priced dramatically lower. Still I didn't have any confidence in my product because I saw myself as a learner--and still do. Brief summary of the above: I committed the classic mistakes of a beginner when "going commercial," particularly with pricing. But I drifted along. Then several wakeup calls came in: First: As word of mouth spread, sales last Christmas doubled from the previous year's, and I made and sold several thousand bonbons last December. Sales continued to grow as those Christmas gift boxes were given as presents. Second wakeup: When I did my taxes for 2018, I discovered that the major revision to the U.S. tax law had completely eliminated the deduction allowed for hobbyists, so even though the deduction had been a relatively small amount, it still helped me cope with my business expenses. Now the total amount I had taken in from sales was just part of my taxable income, and I owed taxes. Third wakeup: As a result of the tax shock, I went to see a tax advisor who specializes in food businesses. It took her only a few minutes of looking at my records to reach the judgment I knew she would: "You need to raise your prices." But there was still the tax rule that a hobby has to show a profit in several preceding years to declare as a business and be able to take deductions from expenses. I had hoped that 2019 would be the first of those years because I could not foresee that I would need to spend large amounts of money on any more equipment or supplies. But then came the fourth wakeup: In doing an inventory of boxes, I discovered a mislabeled carton, which meant that I needed to reorder the largest size of box. These are expensive boxes, and the minimum order is 500 of them. All of these details have led me to the decision to raise my prices--and see what happens with sales. Many may suggest I begin by cutting expenses, but I think one of my selling points is that customers appear to appreciate the ingredients I use. I am not willing to consider lowering the quality of ingredients or switching couvertures. I own too many molds to switch to ones that make smaller bonbons (and thus would cost less to make and would require less expensive, non-custom packaging). My immediate question (aside from the general one of how I could have been so obtuse in my business decisions--but maybe that's a question requiring a therapist) is how much to raise prices. My plan is to move from a price per piece of $1 to $1.50, with a small discount as the box size gets larger. And yes, I know that is still lower than practically any other chocolatier in the world. But my current plan will mean that a 6-piece box will cost $9 (up from the current $8), 12 pieces will cost $17 (up from $14), 20 pieces will cost $28 (up from $22), and 30 pieces will cost $40 (up from $32). It's a very large jump for the larger sizes, but is it too large? My sister thinks I should move to $1.25 per piece now, and increase that to $1.50 next spring. I tend to think it's better to go all the way now and then leave the price alone for a long time. If you just take as a starting point that I have made some obvious mistakes, any advice on how to proceed?

I definitely think there is room on the market. Fuji mentions food prep on their website, but I didn't find that translated into customer service (there is better customer service with the previous owner of the company now at hlvptek.com). Grex has some very good videos on using their airbrushes for food prep (cake decorating in particular). They do make an HVLP gun, but it's not aimed at chocolatiers (the smallest cup holds 20 fl. oz.). Their customer service is excellent and showed some knowledge of the particular challenges of using cocoa butter, but it's not really their focus. What I would like is a gun with a built-in heating method that would keep the cocoa butter fluid (like the Krea chocolate one), and I do think there is a small (but fanatical ) market for such a device. And people who work in chocolate are accustomed to paying outrageous prices for just about everything they use. But I definitely think you are the person to develop this. After all, you have worldwide experience with selling a device to that fanatical market and the connections to make it a "must-have" device in a fairly short period of time! And finally, you know how to provide excellent and immediate customer service. I would migrate to Canada to join your customer service team. All you would need is to get a few famous chocolatiers using the Beal spray gun on their Instagram feeds, and all of us would be clamoring to have it, no matter the price.

As I use my Grex airbrush when I am doing a small batch and bring out the Fuji only when there are many molds. The Fuji uses much more cocoa butter than an airbrush, and although it does splatter well, it does not do gradients well. And a recent discovery: When I have used tape in a mold (as when making stripes), the airbrush has a lower airflow and so dislodges the tape considerably less. A current goal: to see if there is a way I haven't discovered yet to restrict the cocoa butter flow of the Fuji so as to pump less c.b. through it. What we really need is a company that makes an airbrush/paint gun specifically designed for the chocolatier and devotes personnel to providing customer service specifically for that audience. As far as I know, that company does not yet exist (Krea Swiss makes equipment for the general confectioner, but not for what we are discussing in this thread).

Not sure what you mean. You have a Sprayit gun. Do you mean buy more spray guns? Not sure why you would need another one. Most are HVLP, and you have to look for one that comes with a small cup (usually called a mini-gun). I have a 2 HP CAT compressor, and it struggles with the mini-HVLP gun I have, but it does work. As for keeping cocoa butter in the gun: If you mean keep a color in the gun, then heat it up next time, and continue spraying, that won't work because the cocoa butter won't be in temper. I clean out the gun as much as I easily can, but--to be honest--I don't clean it out completely. I get as much as I can back into the container in which I keep each color (having just placed a large Chef Rubber order today and still recovering from the cost, I save as much cocoa butter as I can each time). When I am ready to go the next time, I know the gun will have some solidified cocoa butter inside, but I put the whole thing in a heat cabinet (a dehydrator, to be specific), and it melts out in a very short time. Then I blow that remaining color out and continue with a new color. I know some people feel strongly about having a spotlessly clean spray gun and I admire those people, but I'm not one of them. I don't leave the cocoa butter long enough between sessions as to become rancid. I stand ready to be corrected on this approach, but as long as cocoa butter doesn't smell bad (and I have not encountered that), I just march on with the view that there is nothing inherently unsanitary about solidified cocoa butter.

I looked back through the thread, and the size 5 needle appears to be recommended most (by Kerry Beal, for instance). I hate to say this because I too was using the Paasche siphon-feed at one point, but I think most people have moved to gravity-feed airbrushes. There are just fewer paths for the cocoa butter to follow, and you are not having to get the cocoa butter (which is always in the process of crystallizing--and clogging up the passageways) to work against gravity. I finally got tired of having to reheat the spray cup and feed tube. But if you get the 5 needle, you should be able to make this airbrush work.

The very best way is to purchase a water activity meter, but you may not wish to spend the money for that (they start around $2,200). I think most U.S. states have universities that will perform such tests for you (for a fee, of course), and there are often labs around that do them as well. If you are in the U.S., your state agriculture or food safety agency can probably tell you where.

I had not heard of those previously. They sound great--except for their price, which, on the site I checked, begins around $4,000 (US), and their weight (about 900 lbs.).

I have a 2HP compressor. It runs a Grex airbrush fine, but struggles with a small HVLP gun. You are unlikely to find anything quiet with enough power. There is a whole discussion of this very issue. I think that is in this thread, but there are several others dealing with a "quiet compressor." If you have not read through all of those relevant threads, then you are missing out on information that others have already researched and posted about.

From what Kerry Beal posted a little earlier in this thread: That's exactly what I got. Another place to check is hvlptek.com, where the owner is the former owner of Fuji (and where I received excellent customer service when I was shopping for extra Fuji parts). As far as I could ever tell, Fuji prices are the same everywhere, so there is no point in looking for a bargain. I got mine at Amazon simply because of quick delivery, but they did not have all the extras listed above. And, by the way, I am not the "Jim" to whom Kerry refers in her post; this one is a sales manager at Fuji.

Or you could make a gianduja or meltaway and incorporate cake or feuilletine crumbs, which would maintain any texture they have and give a close impression of a cake pop. Piping the mixture into the shells might be a challenge, but it's certainly doable.

Just to report about the brown sugar experiment with peaches: Any acid in brown sugar does not affect the making of a PdF, at least when using Pomona's pectin. The roasted peaches that I turned into a brown sugar PdF gave promising results, and now I have some Combier Pêche de Vigne liqueur to add even more flavor.