Jim D.

Excellent ideas. One chocolate I would strongly recommend, @JoNorvelleWalker, is Felchlin's Maracaibo Classificado. It has about the same percentage of cacao as the Cacao Barry one you used (but unfortunately costs twice as much), but I think you will find it really delicious. All signs seem to indicate that you have been bitten, perhaps terminally, by the chocolate bug.

No, I haven't tried molding with Orelys, just used it so far for the chocolate chip truffles I make. I did try making an (unsuccessful) apple ganache with it, and in that procedure it acted much like Opalys--that is, it got very thick, to the point that I had to add more liquid. But I have learned to manage Opalys and have no doubt that Orelys would be the same. "Managing" means having some untempered chocolate ready and adding it when the thickening starts and not being afraid to raise the temp to levels that are not recommended for white chocolate.

Those companies may well add preservatives to their product, and there are many techniques for lowering water activity in a product (adding sorbitol is one example). Actually the Aw (activity of water) reading for caramel is relatively low (a caramel so thick that it can barely be piped from a pastry bag will last a long time), but the more fluid it is (as pastrygirl implied), the more issues there are with shelf life. And there is also the complex issue of migration of water and fat inside a bonbon. You can't successfully put a filling with substantial water content (such as a ganache) next to anything crunchy and expect the crunch to last. As I said, commercial manufacturers have many ways of increasing shelf life to the point where the product is financially viable for them. All of this is explained far better than I can by Peter Greweling in the book I recommended (particularly in the 2nd edition).

@pastrygirl, just wanted to provide an update on my quest for a truffle that tastes like a chocolate chip cookie. So I made a gianduja with toasted pecans and Orelys, plus a little molasses powder (to emphasize the muscovado flavor of Orelys) and some coconut oil (to keep the final gianduja from being too firm). I made shortbread bits, cutting the dough into approximately 1/4" squares (it's easy to cut them with a long knife). They did stick together when they were being transferred to the baking sheet, but a little dusting of flour solved that problem. I baked them until they were beginning to brown. Then I mixed them, plus chopped pecans and dark chocolate bits, into the gianduja and rolled the mixture into truffles, which I later dipped in dark chocolate. I must say I was very pleased with the taste--and the texture. By using a gianduja rather than a ganache, there is no loss of crunch. And, as might be expected from the ingredients, the Aw reading is quite decent (0.62). So thanks again for the Orelys idea, which was perfect.

Yes, but that would require guessing what the eventual flavor would be without any possibility of tasting it before pouring the caramel. The almond oil allows for tasting.

I had exactly the same problem making caramelized almond paste. I think of almonds as having an assertive taste, but somehow they do not when ground into a paste. I would have used easy-to-find almond flavoring (which is usually alcohol-based), but because I needed the paste to be water-free (as I was using it in a bonbon to surround a cookie and didn't want to dissolve the cookie), I searched online and finally found this almond oil. It is delicious, and only a few drops made my almond paste fragrant. It comes in annoying packaging (tiny vials that release it drop by drop), but I love it.

Yes, refrigerators are quite humid environments. Unless you seal the chocolates to keep that humidity out, you will almost certainly get what keychris described above. When I didn't know better, I took chocolates to a July 4 party. They were in (mostly) airtight containers and transported in a cooler. That was a particularly damp, drizzly, warm July day. When I removed them from the containers, it was only seconds before the air hit them and they lost their shine, acquiring a somewhat rough texture. To tell the truth, I don't think the people at the party really noticed all that much, but I certainly did. There aren't any shortcuts (that I know of) in making chocolates--you have to follow the rules--and the science. This is all explained in the books I recently recommended in the bonbon filling thread.

I would suggest that you obtain Peter Greweling's Chocolates and Confections and/or Ewald Notter's Art of the Chocolatier. Both have lots of recipes as well as basic discussion of the various fillings available to the chocolatier, shelf life, problems and how to fix them, etc. In addition, this eGullet thread and this one will give you lots of ideas. There are many other helpful posts on eGullet in various threads when you have time to browse.

Here it is on Pastry Chef (it's a large quantity, but it lasts forever). I've done some more looking online, and aside from L'Epicérie and the Amazon link you gave, that's the only source I can find.

I have used Pastry Chef for larger amounts, Chef Rubber for smaller, and (most often) L'Epicérie. "Pouring" fondant is what you are looking for. If you have freezer space to spare, larger amounts will save you money, but unless you produce a lot, you need smaller containers into which to put them for freezing.

Considering that on beanilla.com, the same vanilla beans are $9.95 each, that is an amazing bargain. The test will be how moist they are since (as is obvious) there isn't much one can do with a dry vanilla bean. I just ordered two tiny containers of ground vanilla beans (no additives) from Beanilla to see if they measure up (I hate scraping vanilla beans).

I'm going to give it a try--though nothing as complex as some of those designs of yours. Unfortunately for me the GUM device brings back bad memories of a dental hygienist I encountered once who was obsessed with making her patients use such a stimulator. I agree about taping. If there isn't bleeding under it, then tiny bits of the adjoining cocoa butter drift into (or get blown by the airbrush into) the stripe. PVC tape works the best. Of course, much depends on when the tape is removed.

It is beautiful, but I would guess that "simplicity" refers to its final appearance more than the steps it took to get that appearance.

@Artisanne, those are beautiful and elegant designs. Your eGullet name is richly deserved. I would bet the GUM stimulator company is wondering right now why it is experiencing a sudden upsurge in sales!

It makes sense that cooking the caramel longer (with the addition of a little water as necessary) would darken the color and increase the caramel flavor, but does the baking soda add more caramel flavor or does it just darken the color and thus is a "cosmetic" effect?

My first reaction to this idea was to wonder how I would cope with the sudden changes sometimes required in caramel making. When, for example, the caramel temp goes high too quickly, I remove it from the heat for a little while and turn down the gas a bit. I can't imagine that the Presto cooker temp would drop that quickly. I suppose if it's not too heavy, I could take it off the heat the same way. How quickly does the temp control respond to a change? Or do you use it more or less as a regular pot without too much attention to its temp controls?

That is interesting because I thought that in order to get the spreading of the cocoa butter/chocolate to make the dendrite, whatever is used for the "stamp" had to come into close contact with the cavity wall (as an artist might make a dendrite by pressing two sheets of glass together with paint between them).

Thanks for that suggestion. I didn't know you are a former chocolatier. When did you come to your senses and get out of the business?

I used the same thing, and with the first clay "stamp" I used, the stick came out after just a few times. After that, I removed the stamp from the cavity with the aid of a small knife inserted slightly into the side of the clay, and that solved the problem.

In continuing my quest to become adept at making caramel, I think the next step is finding the right pot. I have Rose Levy Beranbaum's caramel pot, which is fairly tall and narrow--ideal for making small batches, but I question whether it really qualifies as the heavy pot caramel requires (it is really quite lightweight, tipping over easily, and I am surprised that she would put her name on it). In any event, as I make larger batches, it is definitely not large enough. My next size up is an old Le Creuset pot. It certainly qualifies as heavy and works well for medium batches. But as I discovered yesterday in making Peter Greweling's Soft Caramel, it is not large enough when the foaming starts. My largest pot is a "ceramic nonstick" Greenpan, but it too is not heavy. So what do people recommend for fairly large batches of caramel? I suspect a Le Creuset of adequate size might require a bank loan, so perhaps something else?

Bob, thanks for that insight. I know you have a lot of experience cooking caramel.

If you would like to pick up a substantial amount of $$, bring some of those frogs to Staunton for the "Harry Potter" festival the weekend after next. I'm told that last year parents were seen handing over major amounts of cash for all sorts of junk, including some jelly frogs. Imagine what they would pay for a chocolate one! Apparently they play a role in the Potter books.

Thank you so much for that reply. I was hoping you would chime in. So perhaps I should add some baking soda? I like this caramel because it seems virtually foolproof--no crystallizing sugar (though I shouldn't tempt the sugar gods by saying that), but it does take a long time to cook. And I was not prepared for how much it expands during cooking, so had to switch pots halfway through.

Yet another caramel question: I just made Greweling's Soft Caramels (all-dairy version). I've made it before but maybe only once. I cooked it to a temp I thought would work for piping it and it is fairly thick, but it remains rather pale. I checked Greweling's recipe, and the photo there shows a rather pale caramel, just about like mine. Mine has a light caramel taste. Maybe I'm just used to the other kind (cooking sugar first to a dark brown, then adding cream), which gives that "bowl-you-over" caramel taste? But I have seen cut caramels considerably darker in color. I could not cook mine any longer or it would never pipe. Does this kind of caramel (a Maillard caramel, as @Chocolot refers to it) ever get darker? If I need to thin mine out to pipe it, should I add some cream and reheat slightly? I wish I had some way to bump up the caramel flavor.

Those are beautiful. You are so right about that mold. Same with half-spheres and cocoa pods. I suppose it's because they are so shallow, but although it means they are very easy to unmold with almost no sticking, they are very tricky to seal. In her videos Kirsten Tibballs of Savour points out that you really have to examine them at eye level to catch the tilt.