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I found a great place to get my holiday supplies for making candies and truffles. Marque Foods 322 Littlefield Ave. South San Francisco 888-882-7288 This is a great place to get chocolate in bulk at good prices. Other than their "store brand" Belgium chocolate, there are also E. Guittard, Callebaut, Scharffen Berger, Valrhona, and Weiss (it's amazing stuff!). Other than chocolate (44 lbs), we also got some coconut, vanilla beans (Madagascar - $22 for 4oz!!!! About 20 beans in all!!!!), and a box of Paillete Feuillentine. Chocolate transfer sheet (can order custom made ones), praline paste, cocoa nibs and powder, chocolate decorations, nuts and nut flour, flavoring, gelato ingredients are some of the products you can find there. If you want to pick up some stuff there personally (they will deliver for free on orders over $100, I assume in the Bay Area), call ahead and make an appointment. It was good that we did that as we got to taste some of the chocolate before we decided which brand to pick. Susana was the sales rep who helped us and she was really great. Just remember, most items are sold in bulk. The website gives you a good idea on what they carry. Have fun shopping!

I've just listed a magnetic chocolate mold on ebay. 25% of the final sale will go towards Egullet. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...em=220052383847 Happy bidding

I'm looking for glassine pads and sheets, for chocolate packaging. The Revere Group carries some pads, but I don't like the gold/white color scheme--and they don't seem to have thin sheets of glassine at all. The company I used to work for has brown pads and brown sheets, but I haven't been able to find a source for these (and I doubt they have them custom made). Anyone have any leads?

This was the first chocolate class I have taken and I had no idea what to expect. I arrived in Chicago a day early and walked down to the French Pastry School an hour early to deal with any paperwork, but I was told to return just fifteen minutes before class so I headed back to the hotel to grab some lunch. When I arrived back I found there were six of us from outside the school and the rest of the seventeen were current students of the school. We were handed a 25 page class book and signed in. It was a good thing that I ate a large meal because we didn’t get a single break in the whole seven hours! I was warned by jcho that a break may not be forthcoming so I brought a box of crackers and a bottle of water. I was so busy the first day that I didn’t stop to eat, but I made a point of snacking a little throughout the class the next two days so I wouldn’t drop. The six of us were taken upstairs to a learning kitchen where I quickly spotted Chef Jean-Pierre Wybauw from Kerry’s pictures. From there the whole class headed up one more floor to a classroom where we introduced ourselves and he gave an hour and a half lecture on tempering. I had read most of what he had to say before, either here or in his book, but it all clicked and fell into place for me then. All the unstable crystals melt before the stable Beta ones do, and that was the basis of every tempering method. They may start from different places, but they basically generate either just good crystals (in the case of seeding straight from fresh chocolate), or a mix of crystal types and then melt out all but the good ones by raising the temperature into the proper range. A properly tempered batch of chocolate has a certain amount of good crystals which act as a seed when it cools. However these crystals don’t just sit there in the bowl. They generate more crystals which is why as time goes on the chocolate gets thicker. There are two ways to deal with that, the first being adding more untempered chocolate to bring the ratio back in line, and the other to hit it with a heat gun to melt out some of the over crystallization. He kept pointing out that the temperature of the chocolate may be in the correct range, but it won’t necessarily have the proper crystal seed. He also said that you have to stir the chocolate to keep it evenly heated (he was using the Mol D’art melters) as chocolate is a good insulator and the chocolate next to the heating element will be warmer than that on top. There is already a detailed discussion on the melters in another active thread so I’ll leave it at that. What I hadn’t paid much attention to before was proper cooling. Too fast and the temperature dips down into the range where the unstable crystals form and compete with the good crystals for the cocoa butter. Too slow and the crystals form coarsely for a poor result as well. I’m not clear on the mechanism for that however. If anyone can enlighten me on the subject feel free to speak up. He has a suggestion of a working room temperature of 68F and a cooling room/fridge of 50F for the artisan who can’t afford the three temperature ranges that are used commercially. Once it starts setting at the working room temperature you move it to the cooler. Setting chocolate is exothermic so you have to watch placing too much chocolate in close proximity or it could cause some of it to go out of temper before it cools enough to fully set. He later made a point that when dipping you don’t want to place the pieces too close together, especially if they are tall, otherwise the sides could end up out of temper due to cooling too slowly. I have abused my cooling in the past by just popping it into the fridge too early, or even a shot in the freezer if they weren’t releasing easily. I’m going to be much more careful and it will probably do wonders. Then it was back down to the teaching kitchen to watch him temper the three 12kg melters of dark, milk, and white chocolate. That was a simple matter of tossing in callets and stirring until they stopped melting easily. Then a bit of heavier stirring took care of the rest and it was done. Having only used an automatic tempering machine before (a Rev2), I was surprised at the ease. A couple of my classmates who had the melters confirmed that it was pretty easy to temper and keep it in temper, so I am now sold on the idea. The class kitchen, eight tables with two students to a table. JPW then demonstrated the first ganache which I believe was a Jasmine tea. It’s difficult to recall the order of the recipes as we made a total of ten over the three days. He stressed that he didn’t want to make it a class about ganache anyway, but rather on techniques. Over the course of the class he made the ganaches in different ways. With the Jasmine he steeped the tea in water first before adding it to the cream in order to extract maximum flavor, and another time he steeped directly in the cream. He added the invert sugar after the cream had cooled so that the water binding aspect of the sugar not be destroyed. Some times he added the glucose to the hot cream, and other times later. He always added the butter last and at room temperature. Once he chucked everything together at once in a Robo-Coupe food processor, but the recipe wasn’t the best one to demo that way. It was thick enough that the machine kept tripping its breaker, and eventually the ganache separated. That was fortunate though, as it gave him an opportunity to demonstrate rescuing a split batch. He started by taking a small amount of the ganache and whipping in cold cream. That helped but didn’t do the trick completely. So the backup plan was to refrigerate it until the outer edges started to set, then scrape it and mix it in. That brought the small bit together, and he started adding a bit of the still separated batch a little at a time, being careful to not overwork it and heat it up enough to separate again. It took a little time, but he completed the rescue. I’ve had to toss out a couple batches in the past due to this problem so it was very valuable to me. He also hand whisked and used an immersion blender to demonstrate other methods. He said that he will have another book in the future all about ganaches and I will be one of the first in line to purchase it. Later in the day he brought out his new book on Chocolate Decorations and I was indeed first in line. I pulled out cash and was ribbed by my classmates for my eagerness. JPW asked me why I was so fast to buy it sight unseen and I told him that I already had a good idea what was in it based on reports here at eGullet. That reminded him of Kerry’s mention of the site and he said that he tried but failed to find us here. I knew the huge site could be confusing so I wrote out full instructions on how to get to this part of the forum. He sounded interested enough that we might just get a visit. Chef stated his preference for tempered chocolate in the ganache, claiming that it results in a smoother ganache. Most of the time he started with tempered chocolate from the melter and added the cream only after it cooled enough not to take it out of temper. However once he poured hot cream on solid chocolate and waited for it to cool into the range before adding butter. I thought it was a bit odd that butter crystals could temper chocolate and being a skeptical person I’m not convinced that works. I will try the pre-tempered chocolate though to see if I can determine a difference in texture. He then gave a demonstration of creating shells in a mold. I’ve done that many times so I figured there wasn’t anything new to me, but he did go on to state that rounded cavities can be poured thinner than those with square sides as the latter needs to contract more to release. Then he added the tip to let the mold set cavities down on parchment in order to ensure the top of the cavity doesn’t thin out too much. He also had us set it on the long edge if you are creating empty cups to fill later. I flipped mine to the other side after a bit, but I don’t know if it was really required. We made a couple more batches of ganache which were cut later with an oval cutter or the guitar cutter. For most of the recipes there was one set of ingredients per four students so you had to share the duties. A couple recipes were so large that chef just made a couple batches himself. He showed us several different ways to pour out an even slab of ganache, involving a pastry frame, a half sheet pan with a metal bar to subdivide it, a set of caramel bars, and rolling out between a pair of bars in a sandwich of guitar sheets. These half sheet size flat aluminum sheets were SO useful! I’m going to have to find a source for these things. Especially useful for re-rolling leftover ganache when using a punch cutter This is our Mocha ganache Coating it with a layer of chocolate Using an extra tall oval cutter to punch three pieces before emptying. One center is left inside the cutter while the other two fall out easily due to the flaring sides. Remember to cut with the chocolate side down so it doesn’t shatter. Cutting a slab with the guitar cutter. Note the care to produce the least waste. The slab goes at the back of the table for ease of cutting. Chef demonstrated the correct usage of the guitar cutter, including what to do when it gets stuck half way through a slab. After using it I now have a better idea how to build my own. Dipping: JPW dips using the surface of the chocolate to pull the excess away rather than pounding the fork against the side of the bowl. This keeps the fork from being driven into soft centers. He also had a nifty way to dip by placing the center in upside down and using the fork on an end to flip it over and pull it out. He made it look so easy as he tossed a new center in the bowl with one hand while depositing the dipped center on the paper with the other. Detailed instructions for dipping can be found on Callebaut’s website under the Applications>Covering with chocolate / Coating>Dipping chocolates/petits fours/biscuits section. It reads just as he taught us. Using a truffle grid to achieve the characteristic points. Coat the truffles once, then a second time and roll on the grid just as they start to set. He called these Chestnuts due to the look, but they are marzipan, candied orange, orange liquor and orange compound. Another trick I hadn’t used before was to use rubber stencils to quickly form bases for a soft piped ganache. I am on the lookout for a set of round and oval stencils. So far the only source I located on the web is in the UK. That is a VERY neat idea. The bottoms stick to the parchment just enough that they don’t shift around as you pipe. That’s a Kahlua ganache below. The ganache on the table is from a series of "How not to pipe". None of mine looked as good as his. Chef demonstrated caramel making and spoke of the different methods, all covered very well in a demo and other threads in this forum so I won’t elaborate here. Something I hadn’t thought of was the trick of adding water to tempered chocolate to thicken it up for piping decorations. I was warned so hard against moisture that I thought a drop of water would instantly cause the chocolate to seize up rock hard. Turns out that the case was overstated a bit and one can sprinkle a bit of water into a piping bag amount of chocolate to get it to a perfect piping viscosity. We were also instructed on how to properly form a small paper piping cone and form two different decorations, a form of stylized tree and a line of hearts. That one truffle dragged across the paper was done on purpose to show us how not to remove the fork. One of the most useful bits of information for me was an explanation of the Callebaut coding system. The basic formulation is a three digit number, with no specific sequence. The dark chocolate in order of bitterness is 805, 811, 835, 815, and 845. If there is a letter prefix, it denotes a percentage less cocoa butter: A811 is 1% less, B811, 2% less, C811 3% less, and so on. If there is a number, that denotes a percentage more: 1811 is 1% over the standard formulation, etc. Suffixes denote the type of chocolate such as Milk or White. Additionally there is a number of little drops on the package, ranging from one to five drops. The more drops the more fluid the chocolate. JPW stated a preference for the standard formula, though I think we ended up with the “C” formulation on the last day. I ordered from gourmail.com and they had only one formulation of each of the basic types. I had always thought that the chocolate I have been using was a bit thick, so I checked it out: Callebaut Semi-Sweet Chocolate (Belgium) D835 49% Callebaut Bittersweet Chocolate (Belgium) L60-40 60% Wow. The Semi-Sweet was 4% less and the Bittersweet was a full 12% less! No wonder I was having a hard time getting thin shells with it. The Semi-Sweet has just two drops on the label and the Bittersweet only one. On one website the legend states that one drop means it is good for solid molding and not much else. I will be locating a supply of the standard formulation soon. I was very pleased with the thin shells I was able to get with it in class and want to duplicate that at home. Chef gave a short lecture on using sugar syrup for liquor centered chocolates, but given time constraints he had the school staff create a batch in favor of the students. He poured this the end of the second day and left it to crust overnight. Unfortunately the shells he poured it in were out of temper so he didn’t finish them off. I had tried it on my own at home the week prior in anticipation of many questions. One that I had based on the instructions in his book was just what the degree symbol meant in regards to the description of the alcohol. Kerry Beal assured me that it was degrees proof in another thread, and she was right. Well, mostly right. It turns out to be degrees proof European, which is different from the US system. There are at least four different measuring systems so it was good to get that cleared up. I showed him the formulation from another book which varied the amount of sugar based on the proof of the alcohol, and he wasn’t sure why it varied. He stated that sugar doesn’t dissolve in alcohol so it shouldn’t matter, and the amount he called for was to balance the sweetness in the flavor rather than to affect the forming of the sugar shell. I had brought in a few bon-bons from my second home trial for inspection. The bottoms were a bit messy and the shells were too thick, but he approved of the sugar shell thickness and the overall taste which pleased me. I had used a vanilla liquor and enrobed it in milk chocolate. I came out with a better appreciation for how gentle one should be with the syrup after it cools in order to not generate crystals which would cause lumps to form inside the center. He gave a demonstration of using contrasting chocolate colors in molds and using colored cocoa butter wiped in the mold for color. We have an excellent demo of that in the demo thread and a pretty in depth discussion on the “Chocolates with a showroom finish” thread. He used a paintbrush here. Working the chocolate in with the brush creates crystals (by movement as you jam the bristles in) so you have to watch how much you go over each cavity or you risk loosing the shine from a good temper. Painting the chocolate in The painted trays Cleaning the tops A very neat trick for production work is what I call “slam filling”. Rather than painstakingly fill each mold cavity to the correct depth with a piping bag, he used a spatula to drop a mound of ganache on the tray, filled the whole thing at once and scraped it off. Of course you are thinking that you can’t create a bottom now, and you would be right if that was the last step. Chef held the tray at an angle to the table and slammed it down, causing the fillings to shift slightly and ooze a bit out of each cavity. He then took the spatula and quickly swiped that overflow off, tapped the tray flat on the table, and each cavity was perfectly filled. The whole process saved a great deal of effort and would really save time if you were processing a dozen or more trays. I’m sure it would take a bit of practice to achieve just the right touch, but it would be well rewarded. Filling every cavity at once. I wasn’t fast enough on the shutter to catch the “slam” Chef then went on to demonstrate creating 3D chocolates from two identical flat molds. He used a pair of seashell molds and the result was very nice. Candying was discussed as an alternative to coating with chocolate and he showed us his pan with double screens to suspend the centers in the syrup. We didn’t take it any further than the discussion phase though. After three days of chocolate making the class had quite a few trays of truffles that hadn’t been dipped. This called for a mass enrobing using the machine. We sent hundreds of centers through this thing over the course of an hour. I’ll never have an excuse to spend $30K for one of these, but it was fun to play with once. The enrobing machine Warming up the chocolate Chef took the last few minutes of the class to show us how to pack a box for the customer. The first layer – all the same height and neatly filling the bottom Finished results. The flavors are terrific! To sum up, I either performed or watched a fair number of techniques that I haven’t gotten around to yet, and absorbed many new ideas and information that I wouldn’t have gotten in another year or two at my own pace. This was just the right time in my learning to take the class as I had enough experience to be able to absorb all the information, and not so much that I was already familiar with the majority of it. I heartily recommend it! The obligatory shot. Note the nifty jacket my wife gave me for our anniversary! One postscript: I stayed at the Best Western River North which has a deal with the FPS, but it turned out to be a fairly noisy hotel. I could hear everything going on in the street and quite a bit in the room next door which made sleeping in problematic. If you opt to stay there get to bed early to ensure a good night sleep.

So, I'm making a batch of chocolate chip cookies (I like the recipe from The Good Cook Cookies and Crackers book), and my wife walks into the kitchen and says I should flatten the dough a bit after dropping it onto the baking sheets with an ice cream scoop. I didn't and my cookies baked up beautifully, nice and moist and chewy. But I'm wondering what everyone else's preferences are - do you like your c.c. cookies kind of moist and chewy, or flat and crunchy and crispy?

I always tell my new hubby not to suffer the markup on flowers today. Instead, I enjoy a chocophile dream day. Last year's haul included The Painted Truffle -Neuhaus - and Venchi Chocolate from three continents - divine. This year as a nod to a chocolate post on my blog, I got the Vosges Hat Box that includes chocolate covered chili powder dusted tortilla chips. Wow, and yumm. There may not be any left to enjoy in front of the fire tonight! What's on your chocolate wish list?

In heart of Valentine's day, I was just wondering where does one get good quality "house-made" chocolates? I'd imagine there might be a few places in Boulder? Anyone know?

Hello Everybody, Well I just got word that there is going to be a Chocolate Battle on Iron Chef America. This will be airing on February 11th at 9pm. The Battle is against Chicago Chef Graham Bowles. Next and even more exciting is the Chocolate Throwdown with Bobby Flay competing against Fritz Knipschildt. I just got the e-mail from Fritz announcing the battle. Fritz is a Master Chocolatier and is going to put a good name on fine chocolate. This is a must see episode. It is airing on February 8th at 10pm! Great things happening in Chocolate...Stay Tuned! Robert Chocolate Forum

This thread http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=98856&st=0 in the Cooking forum got me thinking about pairing wine with chocolate. I know it's difficult and Port is usually suggested with chocolate desserts, but there must be pairings that work with savory dishes that contain some form of chocolate. Thoughts?

I've searched all over eG for a thread on savory chocolate dishes, and if I've missed one, please somebody link this one to that. But, assuming there's not one - I want to do an all-chocolate meal for my valentine. I just made my kick-ass mole, but we're going to be wanting a break from that by Valentine's Day. Please share your favorite recipes and ideas and links for savory chocolate foods! Extra points for non-Mexican dishes. I can start it off by saying that I'm really intrigued by David Lebovitz's chocolate pizza dough and Cocoa Nib and Spicy Lamb Pizza.

I've been posting about this is various different threads, but I thought I'd consolidate. I finally got the call from the inspector today to schedule a time to come out and look at the kitchen I'm going to use so I can get my food establishment license. (My god, this would all be so much easier if I lived in Ohio!) Anyway, she went on at some length about the need to get my recipes tested for water activity to make sure bacterial growth isn't a problem. I know there are some good books with detailed information on water activity, shelf life etc. Does anyone have any recommendations? Ideally something cheaper than Wybauw, but if that really is the best, then I'll have to suck up and pay the big bucks. This isn't something I need to do before the inspection, but I expect it's something she's going to bug me about later. mrose - did you have to do any sort of testing or demonstration that your recipes were safe? Other things I need to get in order for the inspection: - be able to demonstrate that I know how to properly use the dishwashing/sanitizing setup - have the equipment I'm going to use there (I need to find out if they have a food processor for me to use, or if I'm going to have to provide one) - show that there is designated off-floor storage for my equipment and ingredients on site - have a sample ingredient label showing what's in the chocolates I'm out of town at the beginning of next week, so it'll be Thursday or Friday before all this happens. Hopefully it will go smoothly and I'll be in business!

I've always seen Chocolates with the percentage on them, but never knew what exactly they represented. Do they: - Show the amount of cocoa that is present in the bar? - If so, is the sweetness of the bar affected by the percentage of cocoa present? Just wanted to end my confusion. Thanks

I'm trying to find the style of chocolate box used by richart, or a similar one used by max brenner. Any idea who makes these boxes? http://www.richart-chocolates.com/ http://www.maxbrenner.com/special/special.html (number 2 or number 3 on the page )

Here's the chocolates that Mireille Guiliano recommends, she the guru of fine food and of French Women... fame. Interesting, what do you think? She mentions Noka and Rechiutti ( sp? )is the best according to her!! http://www.mireilleguiliano.com/recommends.htm

I'm noticing a lot of recipes lately that specify using good bittersweet or semisweet chocolate with a cacao content no higher than 60 percent; I guess it's a response to the boom in superdark chocolates and the to fact that so many bars actually do specify how high the cocoa content is now. Makes sense to me, because frankly, when I bake with Scharffenberger or some such, it's just too bittersweet for people who aren't serious dark chocolate eaters. In fact, I recently brought a very beautiful, very delicious frosted chocolate stout cake to a party, and I think a lot of people were put off by the fact that they'd been staring at it all through dinner, and then it just wasn't as gooey and sweet as they'd anticipated. So my question is, what are some good, widely available, under 60 percent baking bars? I think the lowest Scharffenberger I've seen is 62--close enough, but that's what I used to frost the stout cake. Not sure about the Callebaut that's at my Whole Foods, but I'm pretty sure the big Valrhona bars they have are above. I'll confess to a personal weakness for Ghirardelli, but I'd like to find something a little better! Thanks. Susan

Hi everyone, Would anyone happen to know where in the US or Canada I could get my hands on a large chocolate egg mould (polycarbonate or PVC)? I'm looking for one with a length of about 10 inches (25cm) but the largest I can currently find is 12cm. Thanks for your time .

I recieved a double/magnetic sphere mold as a gift. I had asked for a model that has a dimple molded into it: http://www.chocolat-chocolat.com/c210036p16408423.2.html One pushes on the projection and it drops inside to make a small filling hole. Filling this mold is a matter of filling the bottom half to a certain level, cliping on the top and spinning it. But since it was on back order the company substituted another mold that has a solid bottom half and a top with about a hole in the top of each cavity. I am after making hollow spheres to be filled with a sugarless liquor filling that I can seal off easily, so my first question is, does it really fit the need? I ask the question because the original mold appears to have a slope to the hole that would make it easier to seal by dropping a small disk of chocolate in before topping with tempered chocolate. Additionally, the actual hole would appear to be smaller. My second question is just how to work with it. I was told that to make a hollow sphere with this you fill it up and tip it out like any other mold, but I'm not sure just how one goes about doing that. The mold has several holes that run all the way through both halves, so just pouring chocolate on top of both would result in a real mess, not to mention that I don't think it would fill each cavity anyway. Using a funnel seems far too slow as the wall thickness would vary greatly from the first to the last cavity due to a longer cooling time. Does one fill the bottom, put the top on, place a card over the holes and hand spin it before a final tipping without the card? I can return it and wait until it becomes available next year, but I wouldn't mind keeping it if it will work out fine.

I made a chocolate terrine last week. Part of the recipe called for melting 8oz dark chocolate with a tablespoon (or two) of water. I think it was the humidity (monsoon season) which made it seize. So when I folded it into the whipped egg yolks for the terrine, it lumped. It's still yummy, but I'd like to figure out how to avoid it for next time next time. It's never happened to me before, and I'm quite sure I didn't do anything different. Should I just not melt chocolate during the monsoon season?

I recently heard tell of a small sized (table-top?) chocolate enrober--I didn't know such a thing existed, but it's exactly what I need. Anybody familiar with such a thing? Know any distributors?

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detai...KX0DER&v=glance I was looking for some books to buy and I found this one ,isnt available yet , but you can preorder. Does anyone knows about this book? Worth to preorder it and buy it, it looks good . By the way it ships in March.

Someone is having a party on New year's eve and asked me if I knew how to prevent the chocolate in the fountain to get thick with the cold .The only thing I can think is adding more cocoa butter to his chocolate or using one of those chocolates made specifically for fountains .Any other ideas ? Another question was adding alchol to the chocolate and I thought that wasnt a good idea because it would thicken the chocolate etc etc.Is that possible ?In any form? Thank you again in advance

Anyone else notice it's awfully hard to find dutched cocoa powder? The only places I've seen it sold was at the Spice terminal for nearly 9 bucks a box, or at Trader Joe's where they no longer carry it. Maybe Di Bruno's has it? But I bet it'd be awfully expensive. Maybe Nuts to You?

Man, be careful where you tread in Dallas if you plan on passing off mediocre chocolates at exorbitant prices: http://www.dallasfood.org/modules.php?name...=article&sid=78

Well it arrived today, I've been eyeing it on Amazon since September and it was finally released. Lots of info inside, a good introduction to ingredients and flavour pairings. A bunch of recipes that I'm dying to try. Strawberry Balsamic Truffle anyone? Not much info on technique, or should I say new techniques for decorating chocolates. One bone to pick: Bacterial contamination does not equal mould! He says a couple of times that if you contaminate your ganache with bacteria, you'll get mould. 2 different things in my book. I forgot to give the thumbs up for including ounce and gram measures in the book. It makes things so much easier!

Help! Can anyone in the UK recommend some online shops for chocolate making equipment. I think there was one called chocolate world, something like that, but i cant find a basic mould, just something relatively deep for filling. Maybe square or dome shaped. If anyone can help it'll be much appreciated. Thanks,