Jim D.

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.

Hadn't thought of the alien stuff in fruit. Now I can't even eat a strawberry without fear? Had to look up rotavap. So yet another piece of expensive equipment required to make chocolates!

I had misgivings about using cheese in a bonbon filling but was still intrigued by the idea of a cheesecake ganache. I was looking in Greweling for something else and came across his crème fraîche ganache, which uses a large amount of the dairy ingredient. Elsewhere he has a paragraph on cultured dairy products and mentions no caveats (except that they require care when being heated). Then I recalled that I myself include sour cream in a recipe where it is used to cut some of the sweetness of an otherwise very sweet filling. So I put aside my doubts and forged ahead. First I purchased issue 18 of So Good magazine, which contains Susanna Yoon's recipe (discussed above). In addition, I emailed her shop (Stick with Me Sweets) and inquired specifically about the shelf life of that bonbon. The answer was "Our bonbons are best consumed within 10 days." Of course that was not really an answer to my question. I noticed that the shop has fillings called puddings and custards, so I assume the 10-day rule is a stock warning for everything. I decided not to use the mascarpone and fromage blanc for the sake of simplifying things, so instead used cream cheese for 2/3 of the total amount of dairy, with the other 1/3 being sour cream. I bought Greek yoghurt (recommended as a substitute for fromage blanc) but did not use it. As long as the cream cheese and sour cream were not overheated, they were fine and combined well with the white chocolate (I used the recommended Opalys). I had made a dark chocolate shell and piped a little apricot pâte de fruit into it, then piped the ganache on top of that. I melted white chocolate plus coconut oil to make a barrier and piped a little of that to cover the cheesecake ganache, then placed a graham cracker cookie (recipe here--I must say homemade graham crackers are a revelation) on the white chocolate, covering it with a little more white chocolate. I really like the result: There is enough tang to let you know you are not eating just another white chocolate ganache, and the white chocolate plus coconut oil preserve the crunchiness of the graham cracker. Apricot is a little too unassertive in this case; it was what I had on hand, and next time I will probably use strawberry or raspberry. The crucial information (besides the taste): The Aw reading was 0.81. Melissa Coppel says that should last 3-6 weeks (0.81 is toward the high end of that block of time); J.P. Wybauw says maximum of 3 months. That's a big discrepancy, perhaps showing that the Aw is a very approximate guide? I made enough bonbons so that I can check them from time to time for any issues. Possible future experiments: I will probably try the original dairy products (cream cheese, mascarpone, and fromage blanc), might try the yoghurt. I think there could be a little more sharpness to the taste but am not sure which of the ingredients might provide that. Susanna Yoon molds her cheesecake bonbon in white chocolate, so I might try that next time.

With these ideas I can't helping thinking about the possibility of using such a thickened fruit purée in a bonbon filling--the holy grail of including fresh fruit taste without the huge amount of sugar and usually long cooking time required for a pâte de fruit. It would depend, of course, on how much water these starches bind, but I can't believe it would be enough to lower the free water activity sufficiently.

Just looked that up, didn't realize brown sugar was acidic previously. It seems so sweet. Once my peaches are thoroughly ripe, I'll give it a try with just a few of them.

Somehow I knew you would say that. But I assumed this was something you must have tried at some point over the years.

I'm trying to produce a decent peach taste in a bonbon filling--without much success yet. I thought making a PdF from it might help boost the flavor without having to use chocolate to reduce the water content, but that was fairly bland. Somewhere I saw a suggestion to roast the fruit first to add flavor. I also happened to have a "stone fruit crisp" at a dinner recently where peaches and another fruit were combined. Thus the new idea: to roast peaches, add dried cherries, and make the whole thing into a PdF, then add a spiced shortbread cookie to simulate the "crisp." Excess sugar in the result is now the issue I fear, especially if I add any brown sugar to the roasting process (almost a requirement, I would say). And that leads me to my question: Is there any scientific/taste reason that brown sugar could not be used to make a PdF? If it could be, then I could simply roast the peaches in butter and use brown sugar to add the caramelized taste in the process of making a PdF. I think a hefty squeeze of lemon might help control any excess sweetness. By the way, I'm using Pomona's pectin, so the brown sugar would get cooked only briefly, thus is not likely to burn.

I don't know of any reason that chocolate tempered this way would not have exactly the same qualities as when being tempered some other way. If it doesn't have a snap (after sitting a while to allow crystallization to continue), then I would wonder whether it is in temper. When I am making shells for a mold or two, I use this method, and the chocolate is just like what I get when use a tempering machine for a large quantity.

IF (and this is crucial) the chocolate is tempered when you start--which usually means you take it out of the manufacturer's bag--this method works. It's what I ordinarily use when I am making ganache and want to keep the chocolate in temper. You can take it up to 35C or even higher as long as a good portion of it (maybe 1/4 or 1/3) remains unmelted. You take it off the heat, and as the unmelted chocolate melts, it provides the seed to temper the rest. Why don't people use this method all the time? For the simple reason that it's not practical when you are dealing with more than a small amount; it requires too much attention, care, and time.

Were you following Kerry Beal's recipe (discussed earlier)? If you are getting 225F after adding the cream and if you are adding the amount prescribed in whatever recipe you are following, then you can let the caramelized sugar sit a bit before adding the cream. I have one recipe in which the caramel reaches its final temp very quickly. In that recipe (it's for apple caramel), the liquid added is a mixture of cream and melted apple cider jelly. Since it's the same proportions as for other caramels I make, the only explanation I have come up with is that it has to do with using jelly plus cream (so more liquid than using just cream). But I don't think the explanation makes sense, and I remain puzzled. In any event, when the apple caramel reaches its final temp (as I said, almost immediately), it is still rather fluid, but it tests as done (a bit beyond soft-ball stage), and when it firms up, it is the perfect texture for piping.

I take your last sentence as my guiding light when it comes to cocoa butter, and so currently I have my EZ set at 34.3. Lower than that and the cocoa butter was too firm to mix in easily. In theory 34.3 is too high for Type V crystals, but when the silk doesn't mix in easily, it's incredibly frustrating to try to incorporate it (and in the case of colored CB, using a stick blender is not practical).

This is a bit off-topic but follows on your technique: As I am currently embarked on a campaign to fix my caramel issues (namely, that often the fat separates from the caramel, sometimes immediately on adding the butter, sometimes after the caramel has sat a while, even occasionally after it has been piped), I immediately noticed that you use a stick blender to blend in the butter. Many recipes call for waiting a while (longer than the "slightly" you mention), so by that point using a stick blender is practically impossible. Do you ever have the separation issue I mention? If not, do you think blending in the butter this way makes a difference? I have only recently come to the conclusion that what one is doing when adding the butter is making an emulsion--blending what is mostly fat into what is mostly liquid (though each element contains the other as well). If that is in fact true, then forcing the emulsion--rather than just stirring in the butter--makes sense. I am incredibly frustrated when the problem occurs because sometimes--using exactly the same recipe--all goes well. Checking online reveals dozens of pseudo-explanations (caramel cooked too fast, too slow, too much butter added, etc.).

There are many eGullet threads discussing chocolate decorating techniques. This thread is probably the main one for airbrushing itself. A number of us have Grex airbrushes, and there are discussions of their merits (and limitations).

I have the Avantco CFD10 10-Rack Stainless Steel Food Dehydrator. It has stainless steel shelves (unusual for a dehydrator), which support the Pyrex containers in which I keep cocoa butter after the initial melting in the bottles. I melt whatever cocoa butters I want for a session and pour each into its own jar. I put these in the dehydrator the previous night, and they are ready to go the next morning (ready, that is, to be tempered and then sprayed or brushed). I put the spray gun or airbrush in with them, and it is free of clogs. I don't know where you live, but I got the Avantco from Webstaurant for $170. I can also melt chocolate overnight in it (the racks are removable, so it can hold an enormous amount of chocolate). The temperature control is not as exact as I would like, but I am more or less used to it. Having the colors and gun ready to go has made a huge difference.

The customary method is to get the sugar to the color you want (remembering that it will lighten when the cream is added), then add warmed cream and continue cooking to the desired temp, which will be determined by the consistency you want the caramel to have when it has cooled. I think it is absolutely essential to check its temperature as you are cooking it and also check when it is finished by dropping a bit into cold water (this will tell you whether it is at "soft-ball" stage or further along). I strongly suggest you read through Kerry Beal's lesson (which has instructions as well as photos) on how to make caramel. Since you want something more fluid, you simply stop the cooking at a lower temperature than she gives (since she is making "stand-up" caramels). It helps to know that if you accidentally exceed the temperature and consistency you are aiming at, you can simply add some water and cook the caramel again. For pipeable caramel, I cook mine to approximately 236F/113C and aim for a little beyond soft-ball stage. Too fluid and the caramel may leak from the bonbon, too firm and you will have difficulty piping it. For some other approaches to fluid caramels, I recommend Peter Greweling's Chocolates and Confections (he has a photo of caramel oozing out of a cut chocolate that is irresistible).

@Kerry Beal, have you done your evaluation of Ganache Solution? I would not consider purchasing without having some hands-on knowledge of the program.

That's a good question (to which I do not have the answer). I should have added to my earlier posts that if I were making chocolates for dinner guests or for friends to take home, I would not hesitate to use all sorts of potentially dangerous ingredients. I can easily picture a bonbon filled with a flavored pastry cream.

Then there is this from livestrong.com:

I just can't get around the caveats about using cheese in a bonbon that I posted previously in this thread from someone who has a lot of scientific knowledge about such things (his screen name is Sebastian, but I don't know his last name). He described all the procedures he felt were necessary to render the filling safe to sell/eat (they involved sous vide processing and pressure cooking). I am sure many will think I am being overly cautious, but I still recall the cautionary anecdote from an acquaintance of mine. I have posted it before, but basically, I encountered this person, who had been given a box of my chocolates at Christmas, and she informed me, with great enthusiasm, that she was still enjoying them. A compliment, until you know that it was in April that she said this to me. At my shocked look, she added that she had just read the enclosure that said "...should be eaten within two to three weeks." A seller has absolutely no control over what happens to a box of chocolates after the sale is complete. And I am not soothed by the fact that I include instructions on shelf life in every box I sell. I suppose the issue about using cheese comes down to one simple question: how is cream cheese/fromage blanc, etc., different from cream? I don't know the answer to that, except that, at least in the U.S., grocery store heavy cream is "ultra-pasteurized" (whatever that means in practical terms). I wish I had solid information that would contradict my qualms, and I stand ready to be corrected. I would love to know, for example, how Norman Love's cheesecake bonbon is formulated. Surely he has too much to lose by selling an unsafe bonbon. I remain intrigued about replicating cheesecake in a bonbon and have not given up (yesterday I found a recipe for making homemade graham crackers). I found online some dried cream cheese, but (as I would expect) it got very mixed reviews, and sounds a bit disgusting to me. With some trepidation--because I know many will scorn this idea--I will say that in my searching I discovered that Amoretti makes a natural cheesecake flavoring, and I have ordered some. I have been very impressed with almost all of their natural line of flavorings (which, in the case of fruit flavors, are made from the fruit in question, e.g., pineapple, passion fruit, mango). This may turn out to be a total waste of time and money, but I'm going to experiment when it arrives. But I will not be investing in a sous vide setup and pressure cooker in this experiment! There are limits.