Jim D.

Thanks for the helpful list. Just a rough guess: about how many recipes for chocolates does it contain? For someone who doesn't make the other things listed, how useful is it beyond Greweling et al.?

I thought I would report back. I made the apple filling. I didn't have a liquor with apple flavoring in the house, but used vodka so as to get the effect on Aw of adding liquor. It is not a good time of year (at least in the northern hemisphere) to get flavorful apples, so this was not a taste test. I cooked the apples as much as I could to get rid of all the water I could. The Aw reading was 0.91, which, of course, is high. Jean-Pierre Wybauw writes that a ganache above 0.85 lasts for 3 weeks maximum, but I doubt that he was really envisioning a reading above 0.9 as being that safe. I think I'll try a pâte de fruit using apple purée and dried apples (maybe some fresh as well, but dried usually have a stronger flavor--and obviously less liquid). It's possible to keep some texture to the fruit so as to enhance the sensation of eating apple pie.

I am familiar with the Morato book but have not actually seen it. Is it primarily technique or recipes, or a mixture?

@julie99nl, thanks very much for the recipe. It does sound delicious. My followup question was going to be on the shelf life, but you have dealt with that issue. My guess is that the water content is fairly high. Peter Greweling uses "apple compote" in some of his recipes and describes how to make it (which is what your recipe calls for, plus heating the applesauce in the oven until it is as dry as possible--that might help some with Aw). I am already thinking about what might be done to lower the water content. Maybe some invert sugar could be added (but I notice the recipe calls for no sugar beyond what is in the apples and liquor, so that might make it too sweet). For other fruits I have experimented with making a pâte de fruit using Pomona's pectin, which allows the fruit flavor to be more assertive because of the short cooking time required and also requires adding sugar, which will help with shelf life. Unfortunately these ideas will end up masking some of the delicate apple flavor. I do have an excellent French apple "essence" (distilled from the fruit itself) that might help with the flavor. All this is certainly worth more thought. Thanks again for sharing the recipe.

That is the recipe to which I referred a few posts back--it's why I bought the Cacao Barry. Who am I to question a Melissa recipe, but I found the apricot flavor subdued, and the jasmine tea taste absent. Her use of apricot is what made me think of pairing, for example, an apricot pâte de fruit with a layer of caramelized white.

That sounds really good. Do you mind describing how you made the apple compote?

Interesting, the combination of Dulcey and Earl Grey. Greweling's Earl Grey recipe calls for milk chocolate, and I have always thought the Earl Grey flavor was almost overwhelmed by the milk. I'll give Dulcey and also the caramelized white a try. I envy jmacnaughtan's access to fresh bergamot.

I think you have forgotten that once upon a time you were aghast that I was not a big fan of Dulcey. I think it has a chemical-y taste (I know, heresy). I do like the one you pointed me to, Valrhona's Orelys, and I now use it in my chocolate chip cookie truffle. The Cacao Barry caramelized white is much more subtle than Dulcey.

I purchased a bag of Cacao Barry's Zephyr Caramel (so, caramelized white chocolate) for a Melissa Coppel recipe and would now like to use it as a filling for other chocolates, probably pairing it with a second layer. It strikes me that it might work well with a fruit layer (perhaps something subtle like apricot?), but probably not so well with a milk or dark chocolate layer that would overwhelm the white. I wonder about using it with lavender. Any ideas on how to use it would be welcome.

As was stated recently in another thread, Greweling's Chocolates & Confections is highly recommended. He doesn't have as many recipes for bonbon fillings as Notter or Wybauw (though I use Greweling recipes in nearly every batch I make), and it is true that Notter has a great deal of information on theory and technique, most people consider Greweling the expert on those subjects. If you want to know why something went wrong, he is the source. The same applies when you want to start developing your own fillings.

All of the Savour materials are available all the time, so you could easily view the videos at once and print out all the recipes (it isn't a "course" in the sense of Andrey). In my opinion, however, I think it is primarily in the decoration of bonbons that Kirsten Tibballs (of Savour) has the most to offer. I enjoy her videos a lot and she is a wonderful teacher (her recent video on the "feathering" technique, which is referred to on this forum as "dendrites," is presented in such a clear way that I was able to follow it the first time I tried). But if it is chiefly recipes that you need at this point (as opposed to decoration of bonbons), then I would go an entirely different direction and purchase some books from Peter Greweling, Ewald Notter, and Jean-Pierre Wybauw. You don't really need videos to make a ganache. Once you see what the authors I listed have to say and develop your own offerings, then you could take a more advanced look at decorating techniques with Andrey Dubovik (I didn't find most of his recipes for fillings useful).

Andrey deals a great deal with translucent colors, and he explains when white needs to be used to back a decoration. Some of your work looks like things he teaches. Kerry may be referring to the items that are not mentioned in the list of what is needed--some special sponges, for instance, as well as foam blocks, wooden sticks, etc. Many of them came as a surprise to me, but with Amazon only two days away, of course, I got most of them. He calls for some special molds, but you can get by without having all of them. The half-spheres you use are what he uses most of the time. My overall reaction to the course has changed a bit after some months have passed. There are some lessons that I found useless (those dreadful matcha truffles being the most prominent example), and some that I did not find useful at the time but have used since with success. His real "showpieces" are wonderful (the "outer space" ones, for instance), and I use them, or variations of them, a lot. His most famous technique, the "eye" effect, has eluded me. I managed to get it right a few times, but not consistently enough to use it in actual production, but I intend to keep trying. One thing I must compliment you about: you have the shine on your bonbons that Andrey stresses all the time (he likes to show off by photographing them reflecting him waving his arms in the background). So, all in all, I am very glad I took the course, though I wish I could have told him which of his designs I wanted to learn and so skipped a few of them (in contrast to a site like Savour, where one can pick and choose what to watch). I am getting responses to my decorations that I never got from customers "before Andrey."

As virtually everyone on this forum will say: The "bible" is Peter Greweling's Chocolates and Confections. I also like Ewald Notter's The Art of the Chocolatier for its useful recipes. And Wybauw's book has the most recipes of anyone.

An interesting theory. In support of the fact that we can't know what crystals are actually present, I had another puzzling experience recently: Again I was using the Delta machine but wasn't paying attention to the level of chocolate remaining in the bowl. After it sank below the level of the thermometer that controls the heat, I noticed that the shells were taking longer to crystallize. I checked the temp of the chocolate in the bowl, and it was well over 100F/38C. I was certain that the finished product would be a disaster. But such was not the case--the finished chocolates released without incident and there was no sign of untempered chocolate. If I were just beginning to work with chocolate, I might foolishly ask, "How can this be?" -- but by now I know better than to expect definitive answers.

I'm using a Chocovision Delta tempering machine. I raise the temp, then stir as it increases, so insofar as I can judge, the temp is more or less uniform in the bowl. There is a noticeable difference in viscosity of the chocolate after a short time at the higher temperature.

When tempered chocolate starts thickening as it is used, the first remedy usually suggested is to raise the temperature a bit (but not too high so as to melt the Type V crystals). The next remedy I try is to raise the temp above the melting point of Type V for a while to melt some of those excess crystals, then lower it back to working temp. My question is why the first remedy works. It is not melting crystals, so what is it actually doing that thins out the chocolate? Thanks for any insights.

In case anyone else needs gram information (how many grams a piece made in the mold will weigh--which is, in my opinion, a ridiculous way to identify molds, I think volume would make more sense--but it is the way things are) Amazon doesn't include that info, but I checked and each cavity makes an 8g piece.

@sbain, I like that recipe very much. I add more lemon and extra mint. I like the mold very much. Can you identify it (manufacturer, mold no.)? And, for my final "like," I like the colors you chose for decoration, reflecting what's inside. I try to do that whenever possible, but then that would eliminate blue entirely, so I am not strict about it.

@Pastrypastmidnight, that's very useful information to have in this thread. Do you have the model number (there are a couple of Minijets)? Sata is expensive but has a great reputation. And have you actually used it for splattering?

@Casey H.: I should have mentioned that Grex has HVLP guns. I don't know a lot about them, but Grex has some of the best customer service I have encountered. I emailed back and forth with them dozens of times before I bought my airbrush, and they went out of their way to help (even assembling a compressor and airbrush and photographing it with all the connections labeled for my specific setup--very useful for the mechanically challenged, including me). I do not know if their guns are successful at splattering, but after my many discussions with tech support, they will be familiar with this issue for chocolatiers. If you ever want to pursue this, I can PM you information on the person who helped me. It is also significant, I think, that Grex (like Fujispray) acknowledges that its products are used for food decoration; there are many videos showing their airbrush in action, mostly on cakes.

If I told you how many times I have said "How'd I not think of that earlier?" you wouldn't be able to count them. I should clarify about the HVLP gun: Much to my disappointment, the inexpensive one I bought did not do splatter successfully. It had a pressure regulator, but the splatter was unacceptable. Perhaps some of them do, but I would suggest research before you invest. There is only one HVLP gun I know of that states that it does splatter, and I doubt you are ready to invest in a Fuji system. Many people on this forum have Wagner spray guns, so you might check on that brand (I don't know where you are located). It's difficult to get accurate information from spray gun dealers because splattering paint is considered a defect in guns (there are tons of Youtube videos on how to avoid this "problem"). Unfortunately even if you get an HVLP gun for its speed and heat retention, you may still have to go back to your toothbrush for splattering--which, as you probably already know, can work very well (it's a matter of technique--I don't do very well at it, I must confess).

@Casey H.: I have a Grex Tritium with .7mm needle. It is a very good airbrush, but as I wrote earlier in this thread, I can't get it to do more than one mold, maybe two, before reheating is required. Again this depends somewhat on the temp of the spraying room. But the Grex does NOT do splatter. If you go back several pages in this thread, you can read about my experiences. The confusion arises from the fact that the Grex does splatter paint, but it will not do so with cocoa butter. The tech support people confirmed this experience of mine and suggested splattering off a spatula. I also tried a Badger and a Paasche; neither does splatter. Maybe there are airbrushes that do, but I don't know. I have never sprayed luster dust (and don't think I would run the risk, but that's your decision). Grex says a 1HP (minimum) compressor is required for a .7mm needle. If, however, you think you might ever switch to an HVLP gun, I would go higher because my 1HP struggled with an inexpensive HVLP paint gun and a 2HP does not cost that much more than a 1 [correction: I have a 2HP, and it struggled with an HVLP gun--it was fine for the Grex .7mm; I think some HVLP guns require higher PSI than 2HP provides.] My production sounds somewhat similar to yours. I found that switching from a Paasche to a Grex was a huge improvement, but I have to say that the Grex still requires frequent reheating. It got so frustrating for me that I more or less gave up on it. It is still great for gradients, which are difficult (though not impossible) with a higher-power HVLP gun.

HVLP guns do tend to have larger needles, and thus they give faster coverage. A bigger reason that I like them, however, is that they hold more cocoa butter and don't cool down so quickly. With an airbrush, sometimes I couldn't even finish one mold without using the heat gun. With an HVLP gun, I can do several molds. Depending on the needle size, HVLP guns generally require more pressure than an airbrush. But you can get compressors at fairly low prices. There is a lot of discussion of this earlier in this thread.

If you are serious about shelf life, I would suggest consulting Wybauw's ganache books (they are not inexpensive, which is why I included "serious"). He writes about it a lot and uses ingredients (mentioned in Kerry's post) that extend it. Caramel is, as pastrygirl stated, about the only filling I would expect to last for months. But after all that has been said in earlier postings, the fact is that a chocolate producer cannot control what the customer does with the chocolates after purchase. I've had people buy large boxes and tell me later that they ate one piece every few days "to make them last." To my involuntary expression of horror, they tell me (in much kinder language) to mind my own business. And all this is why I have food safety insurance.

This is a very common issue (and why I have mostly switched to an HVLP gun, which doesn't cool down so quickly). It can be cocoa butter crystallizing where you can't easily get at it (between bottom of container and the airbrush passages), or it can be a particle of solid cocoa butter clogging a crucial passageway (0.5mm is a very small opening--to state the obvious). If you have a probe thermometer (such as a Thermapen), stick it into the container all the way, stir the cocoa butter to make sure it is still liquid, and check its temp. I have found innumerable times that I was very sure the cocoa butter was fine only to discover from the Thermapen that the temp was too low at the very bottom of the cup and the cocoa butter had begun to crystallize. Once I applied the heat gun more than I thought prudent, the flow resumed. All that being said, spraying cocoa butter with an airbrush is a challenging operation. Finally, what is the temp of your airbrushing space? Although many people who get superb results (such as @gfron1) keep their area quite cool, it is a fact that if your temp is very far below 68-70F, your cocoa butter is going to solidify more quickly.