Pastrypastmidnight

I’ve found freeze dried fruit at the dollar store of all places! Super easy to blitz in the food processor.

Last minute Easter treats—I had the mold for a week but no time to play until last night. Finger painted. I just filled them with store-bought marshmallow cream and leftover malted milk ganache because that’s what I had time for. P.S. Now I know I really need so white cocoa butter and to freaking make a decision on an airbrush. Maybe reading through the airbrushing thread for a 4th time will help me decide. Sigh .

My teens and I made 12 dozen egg macarons and 12 dozen cinnamon rolls as a fundraiser for their summer camp fees. Then I made some bunny macs just for fun because they're so cute :). Now I need a nap ;).

Thanks for the tips and feedback!

Caveat: my Dulcey bar is a little old—I’ve been savoring it for a while. The Dulcey is smoother and the caramel flavor is more subtle. It’s definitely more of a caramelized white chocolate flavor. The Zephyr is a strong caramel flavor. Like burst of caramel and butter hitting your palate. It’s a little bit gritty. With my samples, the Dulcey was slower to release flavor, but that might have to do with the age. I first tasted Dulcey a year ago and I was blown away by chocolate that tastes so much like caramel. The Zephyr makes it seem a little bland and more white chocolate-y. The Dulcey tastes sweeter to me—the Zephyr tastes more of butter with the caramelized sugar flavor as well. Which is funny because my Dulcey lists butter as an ingredient but my Zephyr Caramel doesn’t. Zephyr specifies that the sugar is caramelized—I wonder if that has something to do with the slight grittiness. Dulcey is 32% cocoa butter, Zephyr is 35.6%.

I’ve now tried Callebaut W2, CB Blanc Satin and Zephyr, El Rey Icoa and Valrhona Opalys. Opalys was head and shoulders above the others for taste. Super creamy, not sweet, almost buttery. Stupid Valrhona. I do still like the El Rey a lot and the Zephyr was solid. They are VERY different flavor profiles, but I liked both much better than Callebaut W2 which just has a weird milk powder/cooked milk/off taste to me and better than CB Blanc Satin (although I only tasted that as a sample in a shop). Once I get a chance to use some of them, I’ll report back. I just have a kg of each. Oh, and Zephyr Caramel tastes divine! A little gritty on my tongue, but such a burst of butter and caramel! I have part of a Dulcey bar hiding somewhere so I still need to do a side-by-side, but I really loved the Zephyr Caramel. That’s a white I could eat every day.

Thanks @curls! I actually don't personally love the gold, silver and brown trays that seem to be most common (I like clear okay, but that seems a lot harder to find)--and I like the idea of not using plastic, but I have been concerned with the durability of the packaging without the plastic trays. @Chocolot, I love the look of your packaging! I assumed that if I wanted to ship product, the trays would be necessary. Do you ship your chocolates in boxes without trays? If so, how has that worked out for you? You guys, I really appreciate all the feedback, info, advice--thank you so much!

@pastrygirl and @gfron1 thank you both so much for your input and advice. Yes, there is so much to think through and so many costly decisions that affect other things—it feels a little bit like “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.” “If a chocolatier buys a guitar cutter, she will want to make sure her pieces fit in her packaging when enrobed so she’ll have to order the correct plastic trays. Once she orders the plastic trays, she’ll have to find boxes they will fit in. Once she finds the trays and boxes, she’ll remember that her molded pieces need to fit as well so she will scour the online catalogs looking for the right shapes. Once she decides on the mold shapes, she’ll have to make sure they will work for the kids of bonbons she wants to make. When she decides on the bonbons, she’ll have to make sure they work in those molds and those molds fit in those boxes. When she realizes they won’t fit in the packaging, she’ll realize she needs different packaging. And when she realized she needs different packaging, she’ll need to buy a different size guitar base.” That. That is what I’m trying to avoid . My poor family. Every time we buy chocolates, I’m like, “Wait! You can’t eat that until I weigh and measure each piece and measure the cavities and overall size of the packaging!”

I hadn’t thought about the larger size for hand dipping—that makes total sense. Yes! I am in the throes of packaging research. It kind of feels like a nightmare—I’ll find something I like and then I can only find it manufactured and sold out of the country. I’ll keep working on it—thank you again for all your help! After spending 3 hours just measuring and cutting one 9x13 pan and one 8x8 pan the other day, the guitar moved significantly higher up my list (it would have been 4 cuts!!!!). And for Christmas, I made 5 kinda of caramel. Cutting and wrapping took the entire day. Sigh.

Thank you so much for your input. I have read all the threads I could find about both guitars and packaging, although frequently on egullet I have thought I’ve exhausted a topic only to discover information on a thread that didn’t seem related , but I’ll kerp poking around. Those were all the considerations I was concerned about. I’ll krep researching and puzzling it out. I just wanted to check and make sure there wasn’t a super obvious industry standard I was unaware of. Thank you so much!

I would use it for slabbed bonbons, soft caramels, pâte de fruit and marshmallows. I don’t have packaging yet, so that’s a non-issue at this point. I wasn’t sure if there was a standard accepted size I didn’t know about or if it’s easier to find standard packaging for the 22.5 vs. the 25 size. The chocolatier near me uses rigid boxes with a clear insert contains 1.25” squares so the 1” ganache squares fit perfectly once enrobed. That seems like a good size to me, but I don’t have super extensive experience with what others are offering. Thanks @pastrygirl for your feedback! I appreciate it .

I promise I did a search and read everything I could find on guitars, but if I missed the answer to this question, feel free to point me in the right direction . TCF carries Dedy guitars with a 5mm base or a 7.5mm base. Is there a reason I should choose one over the other? The chocolatier nearest me who does slabbed ganache does true 1” squares (I measured ), so clearly a 5mm base, but it seems like maybe the 7.5 is more common and is less expensive. Pros and cons? Reasons why you chose the size you did? Or why you would choose a certain size? I feel like I don’t know what I don’t know about so many things . Thanks so much!

Thank you so much! You just made my whole day .

This is my first post here . Robin Eggs Easter egg macarons (malted milk ganache—like the Easter candies). Just for fun. Because it’s apparently National or World or Something Macaron Day .

Thank you so much for the information! I really appreciate it! I am in the US and have been looking at Chocosphere. I will contact them about wholesaling. I’ve just been buying what I can get at my local Restaurant Depot (Callebaut) and I like their 811 okay, the flavor of the 823 is quite nice but both have been too viscous for hand dipping well. But the white I didn’t like at all. Thank you—this is great feedback! I really appreciate it!

White is not my personal favorite either, but it’s a useful vehicle for more delicate flavors. Two of my favorite bonbons ever are Christopher Elbow’s passionfruit and lemon bonbons and surprisingly they are both shelled in white. I feel like when I played around with the Callebaut W2 that milk powder taste was so strong it distracted from the other flavors in the bonbon . I just want to find something that will allow for those other flavors to shine .

Great article—super helpful! I’ve googled things like “best white chocolate,” etc., and it’s never come up for me, so thank you for sharing!

No, this is so perfect and helpful!!! I really appreciate you taking the time to type all that out, especially to include costs and how they are to work with. That was exactly what I was looking for. And less sweet is definitely what I’m looking for as well. I may try to order a small amount of each retail and try them. When you say that Opalys is $72/3kg wholesale, are you ordering directly through Valrhona? I’m having a heck of a time getting anyone to respond to me directly from Valrhona, Cacao Barry or Republica del Cacao. I’ve contacted them all, some multiple times. Crickets. Thanks again for the information—I do really appreciate it!

Good luck! I went through a big sourdough phase but then I got super bad morning sickness with a pregnancy and couldn’t even look at my starter for a year. I cry when I think of all that hard work down the drain. Happy baking!

Do you have a favorite white chocolate? I’ve tried Callebaut W2 and Cacao Barry Blanc Satin and I didn’t particularly care for the strong sweet milky taste of either. I have a tiny sample of El Rey Icoa, which I do really like, but it seems hard to find and $$$. Before I I spend a gazillion dollars on chocolate and shipping, I’d love to hear if you have any advice—what you like the taste of/working with and the best way to get it. Thanks so much!

Does anyone know what this style of dividers are called? I can’t find them but I think it’s because I don’t know what to call them to search for them. They seem like a more flexible option as I figure out my preferred mold sizes/shapes. Thanks!

I made a layered lime and blackberry marshmallow using nightscotsman’s strawberry recipe. I replaced all of the water in both the bloom and the syrup with lime juice or blackberry pulp. I think, for me, they need a little more gelatin. They were super soft and creamy, but a tiny bit too delicate. I also had to coat them twice because they were just a tad too sticky. I used 14g of gelatin exactly, and I think maybe somewhere between that and 21 would be perfect. The blackberry flavor has held up much better for me than the blueberry I made previously, but still doesn’t have the staying power of the lime. The blackberry, however, was a little sturdier than the lime (possibly because it was pulp with fiber rather than just lime juice?) ETA: I added citric acid to both flavors and I definitely think I will do that will all of my fruit marshmallows—thanks @patris!

Thank you!

I don’t think it’s going to work out for me this year, darn it. I guess I’ll start saving and planning for 2019. Is it at about the same time of year each time or does that vary. Thanks!

Her name is Karin Pfeiff Boschek. She’s on instagram and she has a blog: http://ourdeliciousfood.com/