Rajala

It's not time well spent making your own chocolate. Just like most people don't make their own praliné. You buy quality products instead. They probably teach the history of chocolate etc in schools. When you read books about chocolate, it's thoroughly explained how it's made, it's just that most people can't be bothered with it. Just like I don't make my own beer, because it's easier to buy it.

You can source pistachio paste and amazing nuts from Bronte via aromasicilia.com - I'm quite sure that shipping will be really expensive, but you have the option. I bought a kilo a few months back, most expensive thing I've ever bought except that bag of Tahitian vanilla beans. But that speaks for itself. 😭

From what I've been told when asking people, sometimes you add almond to pistachio products because it's so much cheaper. A nut paste ought to be 100 percen nuts, and nothing else. Paste = 100% nuts. I've never seen anything with milk in it so far. But I'm a novice. Praliné = 50 percent nuts / 50 percent sugar. You can have a higher ratio of nuts if you'd like to. Like 60/40. According to the old school, a praliné can be 1) hazelnut or 2) almond or 3) a mix, if you use other nuts the nut used should be prefixed to praliné, as a pistachio praliné, peanut praliné etc.

That's interesting, thanks.

Thanks. Didn't know that. How can one know if there's enough acid? 🤔 I have sheets, platinum type. Weighing the sheets doesn't work, from what I've been told. Since a bronze one weights a lot more than the platinum one. You should think like "a bronze one is 5 grams. 20 grams in total which means 4 sheets, which should also be around 4 sheets of platinum." Not sure if that works over the whole chart, but I've learnt that at least. 4 vanilla beans?! That is an expensive recipe. And I agree with you, how hard can it be to let the readers know that it's gold sheets in use or mass. Reading So Good.. magazine, you can easily see things like here. 10 grams of gelatin, and you stand there with a question mark over your head. Chefs like Coppel are always clear with what they're using though. That's an interesting approach! Looking at the percentage of the total. A chef once told me to use 8 sheets per liter of liquid, and that would make a good mousse. This is not a mousse though.

Something like that, but this pattern is more like cracks in the cocoa butter, right? Not sure if just blowing air would give you that?

I was looking for a yuzu crémeux recipe and found one at callebaut.com (https://www.callebaut.com/en-OC/chocolate-recipe/1357/yuzu-and-white-chocolate-cream-cake) There's one things I find interesting with this recipe, and that is that I should bring eggs, puré, water and sugar to a boil. Do they really mean this? Or is the idea that I should bring it to 82-84 degrees and that's the boil? Or is it sometime safe to bring eggs to the boiling point in certain mixtures? From what I've learned so far is that you never want to boil eggs, to avoid getting a "omelette". Bonus question: recipe calls for 25 grams of gelatin, but it doesn't say what kind of gelatin. Does anyone have any idea what kind of gelatin that are normally used in Callebaut recipes? I guess it's not gelatin mass since they want you to "soften it in cold water".

What kind of advice? Looks great and shiny.

The ones I got sent to me were Nyangbo, Andoa and Guanaja. Well, I can appreciate always knowing what I will get, so I can understand that part.

Anyone running a chocolate/pastry business that could tell me how much electricity you use per month? I'm thinking like if you have a smaller kitchen with a oven, a couple of fridges and freezers. We use kWh in Europe, not sure if it's measured the same way in North America? PM works if you don't want to mention things like that publicly.

Tried three different varieties from Valrhona I hadn't tried earlier. Nothing amazing to be honest. I've tried four dark chocolates from Valrhona and Manjari is my favorite one out of those four. Did get some samples of the passion fruit, strawberry and almond "chocolate". Really interesting actually, you get that chocolate texture with the fruity flavor. I'll probably grab a bag of passion fruit next time I order something. Now I want to try the yuzu and raspberry ones that come out in September.

Thanks. I always temper with the tabling method, so the only problem is reduced shelf life of the chocolate I guess? That's OK. Love the summer, but I'm getting tired of not being able to do chocolate things.

It's now so hot that my white chocolate is on the verge of melting. This have never happened before. Any suggestions on what to do? It's 30° / 86 F, in my apartment 24/7. The dark chocolate seems to have no issues with this heat, even though I understand that it probably not is good for it - but all kinds of white (probably the milk as well) is extremely soft. Do I need to throw it away? Will it be OK? Heat will continue like this for at least a week more. 😭I will not sell anything produced with this chocolate, so as long as I can work with it like normal even after exposure to this 30° for a long time, it's fine by me.

I'm thinking more of the overall cost of running AC and whatever is needed to keep the right temperature and humidity. I got an idea that I should have a shop or something, some time, and I'm just thinking about all the costs to have some kind of budget so I know where I'll end up.

Anyone got any experience with AC/Humidity "hardware" to get the perfect temperature and humidity for chocolate? I'm thinking how much running things like that will increase the electric bill. Probaby quite a bit if you have it running 24/7 and even more during summer? Sorry for hijacking your thread Miriam.

Yeah the single origin ones where really disliked by my colleagues, but I really love Cluizel's Mokaya and Mangaro. Will buy a bit of those when I've cleared out some of my "stock" I have at the moment, and when the temperature is back at normal levels - so that I can work with the chocolate as well.

What kind of silicone are you using? Feels like it needs to be kind of hard? The silicone I use to make moulds is 28 shore, feels a little bit too soft to use for chocolate moulds. But maybe I'm wrong.

I recently bought a bag of Opalys and unfortunately it's the best white chocolate I've tried. I've bought some white chocolate at the taxfree shops while travelling that tastes like it, but no idea if those are "couvertures". However, I think Michel Cluizel's Ivoire is good enough.

Made a blind test with two colleagues just now. 1. They liked the most expensive brand the best (Felchlin), 2nd place for Michel Cluizel and 3rd place for Casa Luker (one of the Casa Luker chocolates scored high though). 2. The variations that I liked the most were the ones that they disliked the most. 3. Takeaway = Sweetness wins over taste with this test with two people.

I love nuts, so I've made lots of nut pastes and pralinés with mine. Walnut praliné is amazing with a touch of salt. I also made a pecan praliné, but that felt like a bit of waste of good nuts, doesn't really do it. Can't remember if I did it 50/50 or 60/40, but would mos def go with 60/40 if I tried again.

How small is this small drum? 🤔

Yeah, we see it differently. I'm thinking more vitamin than drugs. The chocolate cigarettes I had as a kid are long gone. I'm also driving things off topic at the moment. You're staff, tell us to stop. I have that mold, (if it's the Pavoni one by Bachour) and thought about that the taping of it must be quite tricky.

Sorry to jump into this discussion. I see where you guys are coming from, but wouldn't most people see a pill as something that's good for you? That's exactly how I see it. Pills = good. Is it something with two colors that immediately makes you think of some pill full with flunitrazepam or is it just pills over all that triggers something for you?

So, I've tried around 10 different variations from Casa Luker, and you're right. Almost all of them have some alcohol taste to them, one of my colleagues think so as well. I did find one of their chocolates that I liked. Tumaco 65%, it have nice biscuity taste to it. I think I might use that for cheap things, since the price for 10 KG is good. One colleague thought all the samples were good. This was Casa Luker, Michel Cluizel and Felchlin. So I guess that it is like some of you wrote, people don't really notice a difference. And we can add to that, that the bonbons will be filled with something as well.

Thanks for explaining @chromedome So I got seven Felchlin samples today. I tried them all, to much remorse. They're all bloody fantastic. But on a brighter note, they pushed Valrhona off their high horse for me. For anyone who's interested and doesn't know; Original Beans seems to be associated or maybe even owned by Felchlin, the "callets" from Original Beans carry the same logo as the ones from Felchlin.