akonsu

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This is inspired by Aachener Printen. I changed the recipe a little, first, because I wanted to experiment, and then, where I live, it is impossible to find zuckerrübensirup, only on Amazon, so I used honey, which made these cookies less dense and more sticky. Potash, that the recipe calls for, is much more effective leavener here than baking soda that is listed as a substitute for potash.

Some recipes for German gingerbread cookies say to keep the dough out at room temperature for several days before baking, but there is no butter. Just sugar, syrup, spices and flour. My two cents.

I understand now. Thanks. I usually read things like this as that I can cool it to 27 C but it is ok to go lower, not that it might be necessary to go lower. I would expect that these things are spelled out explicitly. Reminds me of something I read about Buddha somewhere, he would respond to questions in a manner that were very difficult to understand, the phrases had to be interpreted the right way and thought about to be understood... : ) Perhaps I need to switch my brain on. Thanks again.

Thanks. That is helpful. I still do not know how to test (in a reasonable time, while working on it) if gianduja is tempered... I would not expect tempered gianduja to solidify in a few minutes like chocolate does. How do I tell if it's tempered? So that I could develop the feel for it, that Teo is talking about.

Thanks, everyone. I believe I was given a wrong advice by the Greweling book then: > the easiest way to temper it is usually to put the entire batch onto a marble slab > and agitate it generously until it is cooled to 27°C/80°F or below. At this temperature, > after constant agitation, it is safe to assume that the gianduja is tempered. Instead of a slab, which I do not have, I used a bowl of cold water with ice, like a bain-marie.

Hello, I made gianduja using 1:1:1 ratio of dark chocolate, tahini and sugar powder. After a day or so it starts blooming. I tried tempering it twice. The first time, I just stirred it constantly until it cooled just below 27 Celsius. The second time I did the same but I also added some tempered chocolate (at about 33 C) to it while stirring. Nothing helped. If I wrap it into a food plastic wrapper and let it set, it is alright for a day or so, but it turns whitish anyway a couple of days later. If I do not wrap it then it gets all white right after it solidifies. The temperature in the room where I keep it is about 20 C. When I prepared it, I let it set at room temperature for about an hour after I made it, and when it got solid, I put it into a fridge, and took it out after an hour or so, and since then I kept it either at 20 C or in a fridge. Please help... Thanks! konstantin

I use a chisel and a hammer for that as well as for solid blocks of jaggery sugar. Plus side: it is a good exercise because to break it into pieces takes a while. : )

The book by Christine Ferber "Mes Confitures" has several recipes with ginger. I think it is possible to find them on the web. For example, http://www.modernbeet.com/archives/318 HTH konstantin

Why is stevia horrible for chocolate?

Hello, there are chocolate bars sold in some stores like Whole Foods in the US, that are flavoured. These are all-chocolate bars, no filling in them. For example, there are bars by Vosges that have flavorings like pepper, bacon, and other peculiar ones (actually, I did not like the chocolate itself, not the flavors, although they say is it "haute"...). How do they add flavors to chocolate and still make sure it is not grainy? I see two ways to include flavors: either grind the dry substance (like pepper, or bacon, or dried blossoms, whatever) very finely and mix this powder into the melted chocolate before molding it, or infuse melted pure cocoa butter following the usual infusion procedure and add this butter to the chocolate, but this would change the formulation of the chocolate, I am afraid... Please share what you know about this. thanks in advance konstantin

As I understand, I can temper gianduja just like I temper chocolate, heat it, cool it, stir, etc. Just use lower temperatures. How to tell if it is properly tempered? Is there a tempering test like that for chocolate? thanks! konstanitn

As far as I know almost all German spiced cookies recipes use Hirschhornsalz, which is another name for it.

I wonder if it is feasible to obtain quality bottoms if, when closing the cavities, you pour chocolate just in to the middle of a cavity, so that it does not overflow these edges that we created by letting it set while laying upside down, and then put an acetate sheet over the mold to make the covers flat and shiny. I never tried this, I have very little experience so maybe I am totally wrong...

I saw somewhere (on youtube?) that people turn the mold upside down and, after emptying it and scraping, put it on a flat surface, a baker's paper, for example, to create an edge along the perimeter, that makes the cavity kind of partially closed, which, according to the video, makes it simpler to fill the cavity as well as to close it.

Thanks, everyone, for the responses. This is much clearer now. I have one more related question. When chocolate is at the right working temperature and is tempered properly, how/why does it stay tempered when it is applied (moulded, poured, etc) and is left to set? What happens when it "sets"? As it cools, it goes through all these temperatures where other types of crystals form, but yet, we end up with solid piece that has all (most) stable crystals. What prevents the other types of crystals form alongside the stable ones when chocolate cools?

But this actually works! Thanks. I just tried this. It took me a bit longer than when I use seeding method. The tempering test was taking more than a couple of minutes that I usually get with seeding, so I wanted to improve the degree of tempering (if this is the right term) by stirring longer. I had to heat it a little when it cooled to about 30C while stirring, but I never cooled it to the proposed 28-ish degrees. Until now I did not know that it works this way, thanks! Strange that the three temperature points method is presented everywhere in literature etc as an axiom. Including the "On food and cooking"...

Thank you, Teo. You are saying that theoretically, when I temper from "scratch" (without introducing new, ready crystals, lets call it "tabling"), there is no need to reduce temperature that much, to the point where unstable crystals form. I can, theoretically, stop just below 34C, if I could, and at this point I will have, again, theoretically, all stable crystals. It is because of the practical difficulties, the ones that you listed, that we have to reheat again, not in principle. Is this correct? konstantin

Hello, here is a quote from Harold McGee's book "On food and cooking. The science and lore of the kitchen." from the section about tempering of chocolate: Unstable cocoa butter crystals ... melt ... at relatively cool temperatures, between ... 15-28C. The desirable stable crystals ... melt only at warmer temperatures, between ... 32-34C. The temperature range in which a particular kind of crystal melts is also the range in which it forms as the chocolate cools. As I understand, this means that crystals form just below their respective melting points when the chocolate cools. Then, if we temper by tabling (from "scratch" so to speak), why do we cool chocolate to much lower temperatures than just below 34C, which lets the unstable crystals form, and then we melt them by raising the temperature again above their melting point (but below the meting point of stable crystals)? If the stable ones form as the book says then it would be sufficient to cool to the temp where they form and not bother with cooling to the point where all others are formed? I am confused...

Thanks. Yes, it is called pryanik.

I think that a funnel is mostly useful when pouring into corn starch molds.

@Kerry Beal, thank you. How would I go about tempering cacao butter in a mix like that? I hear this can be done using the silk that your EZTemper machine makes, but can I do this without it? I would appreciate any pointers. EDIT: I guess that the method is the same as tempering any chocolate, please disregard this then.

Also, here is a post that kind of explains this that I found: https://www.researchgate.net/post/Why_does_a_mixture_of_lauric_fat_coconut_or_palm_kernel_oil_and_cocoa_butter_is_unable_to_crystalize

Thanks everyone! This was quite helpful. What I gathered from this is that this happened because I used almost pure fat instead of coconut cream or milk, and if I added water the mixture would have more chances to solidify.

Thank you. I added the white part and discarded the transparent liquid. As I understand, the white part is the fat of the coconut milk that comes from the pulp that they heat when the milk is produced..