tammylc

I went through something very similar this weekend, trying to find the right chocolate to coat a butter nut caramel in, so I know exactly where you're coming from. Fortunately, I think I've found a chocolate that will work for my purposes (Cluizel 60%). I tried some Maralumi from Michel Cluizel - it's a 47% milk. He also makes a 50% milk, the Mangaro (I think). Both are single origin so have pretty distinctive flavors, but maybe one of them would work well for you? I also like the Orinoco 41% milk from E. Guittard, but i think that would probably still be too sweet. Good luck!

I know there's a wide range of opinions on Zingerman's, and I'm not going to argue with anyone's opinion on that one. But their fries are darn tasty, is all I'm saying.

I made a third batch of caramel last night, this time cooking the sugar, corn syrup and a little bit of water until it was a light golden caramel, and then adding the other ingredients. The final color is definitely darker. The flavor is still a lot like the first one - I think a lot of the distinctive flavor in this caramel comes from the sweetened condensed milk. I was too sweet-ed out last night to do the side by side comparison test, though.

Oh - cool thing - I tempered some chocolate the old fashioned way! I was direct tempering my chocolate in the microwave for dipping the test caramels, and on the Maralumi i left it in too long and went right up to the top of the tempering curve. I usually temper using the seed method, but I had used all of the Maralumi that I had left. So I dumped a third of the chocolate onto my granite countertop, worked it with my bench scraper until it was thick, and then put it back into the bowl with the rest of the chocolate. I was working with a really small amount and fully expected it not to work. So I was amazed and pleased that the chocolate set up perfectly with no bloom and a good shine! I think I need to get a marble sink cut out to have at my work kitchen (I was playing at home today) so that I have a back up method always at hand!

I've been playing around with flavors in preparation for Christmas. I made a batch of the Butter Nut caramels from the Carole Bloom "Truffles, Candies and Confections" book, and then experimented with different kinds of chocolate to dip them in. The flavor of the Michel Cluizel 38% milk just blended right into the caramel, and you couldn't tell it was even there. The 72% dark completely overwhelmed the caramel. So then I tried some Maralumi milk (47% milk from Papau-New Guinea) and some 60% dark. I didn't think the varietal characteristics of the Maralumi were harmonious with the caramel, although I like the chocolate on its own. The 60% seemed like the best fit of what I tried today - nice contrast, but not overwhelming. One thing that would help the balance would be if the caramel were a little darker. Like all the recipes in the Bloom book, she calls for just putting all the ingredients in the pan at once and cooking to a finish temperature. It has sugar, corn syrup, milk, cream, sweetened condensed milk, butter and vanilla. I like the flavor and consistency of the caramel - if i just want to make it a little darker in flavor, any suggestions on how to do it? Should i just cook the sugars separately before adding the liquid and butter? Will that change my finish temperature (240)? In addition to that, i made another batch of nut caramels using the Epicurious Fleur de Sel recipe, but both the sugar and the nuts got a bit dark, so they're best for those who are fans of burnt sugar caramels... I also made mini-batches of peppermint and coffee marshmallows and dipped some of them in chocolate.

Hey Magus, way upthread when you were talking about fries, you said that no one else in Ann Arbor is serving fresh cut. Which isn't true. If you haven't had a burger and fries at Zingerman's Roadhouse, you need to - they are good. Expensive, but good. Other places with good fries are Red Hawk and the lunch counter at Monahan's Seafood in Kerrytown.

Thanks for the tip on Chocosphere! i have to order a bunch of tasting squares, and should be able to make that minimum.

In a bunch of threads over the last few days, I've come across references to chocolate wholesalers that I'd never heard of before. I don't think there's any single thread where we've all listed our favorite sources, and I know it's a resource I would have found really useful for when I was getting started. So I figured I'd start one. Assouline and Ting - wholesale, no minimum order. Great prices on E. Guittard, also has Valrhona. http://www.icaviar.com/Store/Scripts/prodL...?idCategory=387 Noble Ingredients - Michel Cluizel's USA operation. http://uk.cluizel.com/chocolatier/Retailers/48.html Chocosphere - Big advantage here is huge variety, in both brands and package sizes. But prices are not as good as the others. http://chocosphere.com/ Where do you source your chocolate?

I had a similar problem with yield on one recipe in the Schotts book, but that round of truffles turned out bigger than I like mine to be, so I don't blame him. If you like a bigger truffle, then you'll get fewer from the recipes.

As Mark said, the cheapest shipping method is just fine. The $30 they mention on the other page is for caviar, which does need to be shipped overnight. Unless you live somewhere warm, ground shipping will be fine. I think my last shipment for Assouline and Ting cost me $18 for 2 5-kilo boxes.

Thank You! The next game is 11/17/07 at high noon. We will be out there early...about 8:30-9:00. We are saving the Let, tom and Mayo for the establishment. I think you were the young lady that orderd the kosher frankfurter as well. I would love to earn a spot on your food blog so I will keep working at it ← Yes, that was me. And this "young lady" turned 35 today, so she certainly appreciates the "young" comment. I didn't mean the comment about lettuce/tomato/mayo to be a criticism - i was happy to take what i could get via the drive-thru. I'm hoping to be back on the 17th with another foodblogger in tow - sharing the love.

The E Guittard is good quality couverture, and at competitive price. Check out Assouline and Ting for even better prices if you're willing to buy 5 kilos at a time. The wafers just make for easy portioning, they're not anything like chocolate chips in terms of tempering. It tempers really well, and has good viscosity. I've not noticed a pronounced raisin flavor in the 61%. It's a pretty neutral chocolate. The 72% is also nice. I ended switching away from E Guittard because I found a cheap source for an even better chocolate, but I used it exclusively for over a year and was very happy with it.

Another drive thru user here. I was going to go down early before traffic got insane, but that plan fell apart. But I braved the game day traffic anyway and called my order out the window of my car. I was worried about tying up traffic, so I drove around the block and came back for a pickup. Mighty fine burger. Mighty fine. Although i wanted some lettuce, tomato and mayo. That would have made it perfect. I was going to eat half and save the other for hubby, but somehow it didn't make it back to the house... When's the next game? I need my fix...

70% and 85% bars are certainly low in sugar, but not necessarily fat. That number refers to cocoa solids and cocoa butter, so cocoa butter can be a big proportion of the total. But the rest of your point is spot on - if chocolate's to have any health benefit at all re. antioxidants, it must be fine dark chocolates.

Thanks, Patris. I did add orange food coloring to the pumpkin ones to punch up the color a bit.

Blackberry bats (with blackberry powder in the dusting mix), vanilla ghosts, and pumpkin pie pumpkins. The pumpkin ones are amazing. I'm going to make more and hand them out for Halloween (we live in an intentional community, and almost all the kids we get are neighbors, so I can get away with giving homemade stuff out).

Lots of Halloween fun over at Tammy's Tastings. Here's a shot of my Halloween Candy for Grownups assortment. The ones with the ghost transfer sheets are PB&J, the orange-ish ones are pumpkin pie, the red are apple cider caramel, the purple are blackberry, and the mayan design ones are chipotle. I also had coconut in the assortment, but after I took the picture I realized this box doesn't have any. But I assume you know what truffles rolled in coconut look like. Amidst making about 375 pieces of the chocolates, i also made... Marshmallows! I included a little bag with 1 of each flavor in my Halloween orders, as a sneak preview for future offerings. These are blackberry bats (with some blackberry powder in the dusting powder), vanilla ghosts, and pumpkin pie pumpkins.

I attended a chocolate conference with Chloe Doutre-Rouissel a few weeks ago, and we tasted a single origin Papau-New Guinea from Belcolade next to a Valrhona blend, and the quality difference was clear. I think it would be safe to say that any Valrhona or Cluizel blended chocolate is likely to be better in some sort of absolute sense than, say, a single origin from Lindt or Hershey. And better is in the eye of the beholder, of course - some people really like the high acidity and red fruit notes of Madagascar beans (I'm one of them). Some people like the green olive of Michel Cluizel's Sao Tome bars - but most people I've given that single origin bar to think it's absolutely vile. I don't think there's a lot of examples of specially named or promoted blends right now, but Chloe thinks that will be the next wave of the chocolate revolution once we play out the single origin craze, and I tend to agree. I'm very surprised at seventypercent.com ranking Lindt 70% highly - it's pretty dismal chocolate as far as I'm concerned...

merlicky - what a great account! I run chocolate tastings for my business, and I hope I've seen suck revelations in my clients eyes - but you described it so very nicely! gfron1 - Don't write off blends entirely. Single origin/plantation does not necessarily equal better - I've had some dismal single origin bars and some fabulous blended bars! Single origins are definitely interesting, and tasting them against one another can help reveal the wide range of flavors found in chocolate. But coffee went through a similar single origin craze, and is now turning back to blends as coffee roasters realize that single beans - while interesting - can also be one dimensional. Careful and intelligent blending of chocolate can emphasize strengths and balance weaknesses, and isn't necessarily about low costs and inoffensiveness.

I second everything Kerry says. In the recipe you described, you used 2 parts white chocolate to 1 part cream to start off. That would be fine for dark chocolate, but will be a very soft ganache for white. If you still want to play with white chocolate, try using a ratio of 3 or even 4 parts of chocolate to the cream. You will find the Grewling book very helpful once it comes in. He explains things in great detail and includes lots of troubleshooting tips. Try some of his formulas as written first (using the percentages to adapt them to smaller quantities) so you can see how it's supposed to work, then start playing with your own formulas.

Are you using milk chocolate, dark chocolate, white chocolate? And what kind? Different brands of chocolate will have different amounts of cocoa butter, which will effect viscosity. The standard ratio for dark chocolate truffle centers is 2 parts chocolate to one part liquifier (combined weight of cream, fruit puree, butter, liqueur). Milk chocolate ratio is more like 1:2.5 (I don't use milk much, so I'm not the best to ask on that one...) What technique are you using to make your ganache? There are two main techniques described in the Grewling book - 1) finely chop your chocolate, pour your cream over top, let set for a couple of minutes, then stir to emulsify. Or 2) use melted chocolate at temper, pour 105 degree cream over top, stir to emulsify. Either will work. I have made ganache with melted chocolate that is not in temper, but it sets up much faster if you use tempered chocolate. We might be able to help you more if you posted the formulas you're using. Are you using weight or volume measures?

"Too thick" or "too fluid" will vary depending on what you want to use your ganache for. Are you making truffle centers, glazing a cake, or something else entirely?

Burger for breakfast sounds great to me. I hope to see you Saturday morning!

Thanks to annarborfoodie for pointing me this way - man, that looks like a great burger! Magus - what's the best time for a townie who just wants a burger to hit your stand and minimize being caught up in game traffic?

I was using E. Guittard up until very recently, but i've just switched over to Michel Cluizel. It has great flavor and is very easy to work with. Expensive, but I'm ordering it directly from the distributor, so that puts it within the realm of possibility. I liked the Guittard, it tempered nicely and had good viscosity, but the 72% had a bit of a smoky bitter finish that some of my tasters noticed and didn't like. The Cluizel has always been my favorite, but was financially out of reach until i figured out to order it direct.