Teaching Three Days of Confectionery

[Kerry Beal]

I had an email in early April on my website asking if I would be willing to teach confectionery to someone who is interested in becoming an artisanal candy maker.

I assumed it was someone living close by who would come by a time or two to learn what they could, however it turned out that Pamela lives in Los Angeles and was so excited about the opportunity to learn that she was willing to come all the way up to Southern Ontario and spend a 3 day weekend of solid candymaking.

Apparently someone had pointed her to the confectionery course here on eG and while she read through it, having had no experience cooking, she wasn't comfortable trying things on her own.

Pamela has been very successful in her current business but loving candy as she does, sees high end confectionery in her future. One wonderful thing about Pamela is that she doesn't feel constrained by the rules, never having cooked before, anything goes. She's a quick study, and she has these wonderful ideas of things she wants to try. I can't wait to see what she creates, I suspect when she turns her hand to it we might just see her do things that are new and groundbreaking in confectionery.

I haven't been as good at taking pictures as I should, but I'll try to give a little overview of what we have covered so far and I'll try to take more tomorrow.

So Pamela showed up on Friday morning at 9 am, just after I got the rug rat off to school. Our first project was jelly beans, something she was most interested in learning. We needed to start with them because they are really a two day project, the first to build up the soft panned coat and the second to polish and seal them.

The coating pan in the middle of a rather disorganized kitchen.

The jelly beans after coating, set out to dry over night.

Soft panning involves coating jelly bean centers with alternating layers of sugar syrup and sugar. The movement in the pan compacts the sugar crystals together to allow them to form a sugar crust around the center. Colour and flavour are added in the sugar syrup and you use finer sugar in the outer layers, ending finally with confectioners sugar.

Pamela chose honeydew flavour for the jelly beans, and they are absolutely amazing to taste.

Today we polished the jelly beans, after rehydrating the surface with a 60% sugar syrup, a bit of wax is added to the pan and it is run until the beans start to shine. Shellac is applied, the pan runs to distribute it, then air is applied to flash off the solvent.

As you can see we didn't end up with a uniform finish on the jelly beans, there is some mottling of the colour. We split the batch in two for polishing and to the other half we added a bit more rehydrating syrup, but we had more issues with mottling and never did get them to shine. E-mails are out to see if we can figure out exactly what needs improvement. I need a resource on the finer points of polishing soft panned goods.

Our next project was to start some orange rinds candying. Pamela wants to learn to candy whole fruits, however 3 days really only allows us time to do some rinds. The original recipe actually calls for candying over 8 days, but I've discovered that if I reboil when I think of it (usually first thing in the morning, after I get home from work and just before I go to bed) that I can get them done in 3 or 4 days.

Sponge toffee was our next item. I don't have pictures of batch number one - we could have posted that on the regrettable food thread - I always say to just barely mix in the baking soda, however we discovered that you can actually undermix it. Looked like something the cat chucked up.

Here is Pamela measuring out almonds for the nougat we made, finished pictures aren't so great. We added some candied orange rind to the almonds and pistachios at the last minute, it was a little moist which made for a nougat that was a bit soft, but darn tasty.

A batch of caramel today was divided to make some chewy caramels, coating for marshmallows and dipping some pretzels before rolling in pecans.

We had some issues in our attempts to make pulled hard candy today. The recipe gave a large range for the hard crack stage and the first boiling was a bit soft. We reboiled, but the lemon juice added at the end of the boil caused too much inversion and we had quite the sticky mess on our hands. Tomorrow pulled candy again, until we get it right.

Our last project today was starch molded gummies, orange colour and flavour. Not quite enough flavour - we used the recipe from Greweling's Chocolates and Confections - which just said to add flavour 'as required'. Trouble is at 120 C you don't really want to be tasting the jelly.

Last night I dragged Pamela with me to Scarborough where I was doing a chocolate class for a bridal shower. Seventeen girls, a very warm house, a very late night. Pamela is not interested in chocolate, doesn't actually like it very much, but I felt it wouldn't hurt to learn for her to learn a bit about chocolate tempering.

[CanadianBakin']

Wow!! Thanks for posting all this Kerry. I'm looking forward to the rest of her lessons.

[gfron1]

Absolutely fantastic opportunity! Looking forward to the next post.

[Mary F]

yum...honeydew jelly beans!

looking forward to hearing more...

[K8memphis]

I love the jelly beans they are beautiful. What a wonderful adventure. Waiting breathlessly for the next instalment. So exciting.

I do not understand the language of 'whosoever doesn't like chocolate very much' What's not to like? Why not? Hot chocolate? Chocolate cake? Chocolate chip cookies? Chocolate sculptures? Not to mention fudge and candy and savory items. The amazingness of the versatility of chocolate is overwhelming. You must (attempt to) convert her before she leaves.

Geez I love your candy set up with the rolly thing I can't think of the name of, the coater thing, too cool.

[Kerry Beal]

The first order of business today was sifting the gummies out of the starch and oiling them. The orange flavour was not very pronounced, but the rather unpleasant gelatin flavour was less noticable. The texture was excellent.

We dipped a few of the gummy squares in chocolate.

The caramel coated, toasted pecan rolled pretzels were treated to a drizzle of tempered milk chocolate.

The caramel was cut and wrapped in a few of my 10,000 4x4 cello wrappers. The whole time I was thanking John DePaula for the wrapping lessons and the link to the vendor of these pieces of cello, they are so much easier to twist than what I have been using.

Our first project this morning was marshmallow. Nightscotsman's version, using Boiron frais de bois puree.

Pamela is a big Peep fan and piped out some shapes. These 'Ugly Ducklings' are shown before and after a sugar coating. This recipe is pretty tender for piped shapes. I suspect a recipe with a bit more gelatin might be the way to go.

Our next project was an attempt at peanut butter filled pulled candy. Here we see Pamela - with the new bane of her existance - measuring out glucose. It's one of the reasons that weighing confectionery ingredients is so much preferred.

The center is peanut butter and glucose warmed.

You make the candy, pull it a bit, make a rectangle in which you encase the filling, then pull to a thin rope. Meanwhile you pull another chunk of the candy and twist that together with the filled rope you have made. That's the theory. A heat lamp would have definately helped. Things got too cool too fast and the filling couldn't be encased in the candy, the other lump of candy couldn't be stretched because it was too cool. So we have these lovely looking huge chunks of candy smeared with peanut butter. Bet they will still get eaten at work tomorrow.

Our next project was to perfect sponge toffee. We liked the taste and texture of the first recipe, but wanted a nice thick chunk. We considered using the same recipe and pouring it between caramel rulers. The second recipe was just not good, wrong texture altogether. That is when Pamela noticed the recipe in Grewelings Chocolates and Confections. It was a little different containing gelatin, which seemed quite odd, but the picture looked amazing, so we decided to try it. Well it worked perfectly, poured into a 9 by 13 buttered and floured pan it produced this fabulous sponge. We have broken off a bit, but attempts to cut it have failed. I think I need to find an electric carving knife, I suspect that is going to be the way to wrangle it into chunks suitable for dipping.

Our last item for the day was to sucessfully get something pulled to work. We chose a simpler recipe than before and finally finished with some pulled candy. Most we just cut it into pieces but Pamela wanted to experiment with rolling some into a ball shape. It became clear that if you wanted to make a lot of these, you would need to keep the sugar warm as it hardens quite quickly once it is pulled.

Pamela took the opportunity to order a copy of Grewelings Chocolates and Confections before packing up to go.

Pamela only took a small amount of what we made home with her. Her favorites - the jelly beans, gummies, sponge toffee and 'Ugly Ducklings' (Peep imitations).

I look forward to seeing what she produces once she gets home and has a chance to start playing with recipes.

[Beth Wilson]

What a great idea!!! Great Pictures too!

[Mary F]

Hi Kerry,

I have used a chocolate cutting fork on the sponge toffee and had good luck with getting it to smaller more uniform sizes for dipping. Just a small tap with a rubber mallet does the trick. Of course, there is a ton of crumb waste, but am sure you can find uses for that!

Do you use a specific recipe for your jelly beans?

[Kerry Beal]

Hi Kerry,

I have used a chocolate cutting fork on the sponge toffee and had good luck with getting it to smaller more uniform sizes for dipping.  Just a small tap with a rubber mallet does the trick.  Of course, there is a ton of crumb waste, but am sure you can find uses for that!

Do you use a specific recipe for your jelly beans?

←

Excellent idea with the chocolate fork. No matter what I do there is bound to be a ton of crumbs.

The jelly beans follow more of a formula than recipe - so much syrup for a certain weight of centers then a few scoops of sugar etc.

[prairiegirl]

Thanks Kerry. I am always quite blessed with all your input and knowledge. You and many others who post your various outcomes save me a lot of time and effort by knowing what works well, and by what doesn't. The sponge toffee is a good example. Oh, panning machines..I have two big machines sitting in storage. I will have to get instruction on how to use them once I get the shop going. I may go to Glendale for the help.

Thanks.

[Kerry Beal]

Thanks Kerry.  I am always quite blessed with all your input and knowledge.  You and many others who post your various outcomes save me a lot of time and effort by knowing what works well, and by what doesn't. The sponge toffee is a good example.  Oh, panning machines..I have two big machines sitting in storage.  I will have to get instruction on how to use them once I get the shop going.  I may go to Glendale for the help.

Thanks.

←

How big are these panning machines? What or where is Glendale?

[prairiegirl]

The machines are I think about 38 inches. They are big! One is the enrobing coating, the other is for polishing. QSP owned them previously. There is a confectionary shop in Glendale Arizona and my sales consultant has suggested that I go there as he is good friends with the owners.

[Kerry Beal]

The machines are I think about 38 inches.  They are big!  One is the enrobing coating, the other is for polishing. QSP owned them previously. There is a confectionary shop in Glendale Arizona and my sales consultant has suggested that I go there as he is good friends with the owners.

←

Those are huge. What products do you plan to make?

[Kerry Beal]

I took sponge toffee, some of the not very peanut buttery honeycomb, some nougat, jelly beans and marshmallow to the emerg today. It had pretty much disappeared by the time I left. Interesting that with the red colour and honeydew flavour that people interpreted the jelly beans as being watermelon flavoured.

One of the paramedics explained to me that sponge toffee is cooked just like crack - I guess bicarb must be added. Perhaps we should change the name to crack candy!

[prairiegirl]

Just got back this evening from my Vancouver holiday! The panning machines are for doing nuts. I see them as a great opportunity for supplying product for fundraisers for schools, sports team etc.. I plan on opening a high end chocolate shop sometime in the fall and I am most interested in chocolate...not so much confectionary.

[Kerry Beal]

Just got back this evening from my Vancouver holiday!  The panning machines are for doing nuts.  I see them as a great opportunity for supplying product  for fundraisers for schools, sports team etc..  I plan on opening a high end chocolate shop sometime in the fall and I am most interested in chocolate...not so much confectionary.

←

I think that is a great idea. Too many panned products use not so great chocolate. The challenge will be getting the fund raisers to put out the money for the good stuff. Although I suppose there is room to make products of differing quality for different budgets. Your time is still going to cost the same however.

Have you had a chance to look at the demo that I did on chocolate panning a while back? Thread here. It won't answer all your questions, but it will at least help you decide what questions you need answered. Don't hesistate to ask me anything as you play with it.

I hope you are going to start a thread about your chocolate shop as you go through the process of opening etc, we all love Tammy's thread about starting her chocolate business, it's great to live the dream vicariously.

[Kerry Beal]

Hi Kerry,

I have used a chocolate cutting fork on the sponge toffee and had good luck with getting it to smaller more uniform sizes for dipping.  Just a small tap with a rubber mallet does the trick.  Of course, there is a ton of crumb waste, but am sure you can find uses for that!

Do you use a specific recipe for your jelly beans?

←

Mary, thanks for the suggestion of the chocolate cutting (ice chipping) fork for the sponge, it has been a godsend. I have now got a customer - a nice little ice cream shop out on the niagara penninnsula -who wishes to buy it, however she wants it chocolate dipped. So what I have done is used the fork to chop it into pieces of around 100 grams, dipped the big chunks, then chopped each of those into 3 or 4 pieces so you can see the sponge. The crumbs make great sponge bark. She doesn't know it yet, but she's going to be buying that too.

Now I have to find a couple of big airtight containers to transport and store it in so it doesn't soften.

Since I'll leave the containers with her I want to find fairly inexpensive ones, in case they don't always make it back.

[mrose]

Just got back this evening from my Vancouver holiday!  The panning machines are for doing nuts.  I see them as a great opportunity for supplying product  for fundraisers for schools, sports team etc..  I plan on opening a high end chocolate shop sometime in the fall and I am most interested in chocolate...not so much confectionary.

←

I think that is a great idea. Too many panned products use not so great chocolate. The challenge will be getting the fund raisers to put out the money for the good stuff. Although I suppose there is room to make products of differing quality for different budgets. Your time is still going to cost the same however.

Have you had a chance to look at the demo that I did on chocolate panning a while back? Thread here. It won't answer all your questions, but it will at least help you decide what questions you need answered. Don't hesistate to ask me anything as you play with it.

I hope you are going to start a thread about your chocolate shop as you go through the process of opening etc, we all love Tammy's thread about starting her chocolate business, it's great to live the dream vicariously.

←

Kerry

Most recipes for chocolate covered macadamia nuts want you to caramelize the nuts. Do you add a hot syrup mixture to the nuts while in the drum or do you do this in the oven?

Mark

[Kerry Beal]

Just got back this evening from my Vancouver holiday!  The panning machines are for doing nuts.  I see them as a great opportunity for supplying product  for fundraisers for schools, sports team etc..  I plan on opening a high end chocolate shop sometime in the fall and I am most interested in chocolate...not so much confectionary.

←

I think that is a great idea. Too many panned products use not so great chocolate. The challenge will be getting the fund raisers to put out the money for the good stuff. Although I suppose there is room to make products of differing quality for different budgets. Your time is still going to cost the same however.

Have you had a chance to look at the demo that I did on chocolate panning a while back? Thread here. It won't answer all your questions, but it will at least help you decide what questions you need answered. Don't hesistate to ask me anything as you play with it.

I hope you are going to start a thread about your chocolate shop as you go through the process of opening etc, we all love Tammy's thread about starting her chocolate business, it's great to live the dream vicariously.

←

Kerry

Most recipes for chocolate covered macadamia nuts want you to caramelize the nuts. Do you add a hot syrup mixture to the nuts while in the drum or do you do this in the oven?

Mark

←

The only caramelized nuts I've coated were already coated when I put them in the pan. I suspect if you poured the hot syrup into the pan you'd be cleaning it until the cows come home. So I'd do them in the oven first, then completely cool them before panning.

By the way Pamela won a great looking little coating pan on e-bay yesterday. Copper pan, household current. Looks like it will be a perfect experimental pan for her.

[mrose]

Just got back this evening from my Vancouver holiday!  The panning machines are for doing nuts.  I see them as a great opportunity for supplying product  for fundraisers for schools, sports team etc..  I plan on opening a high end chocolate shop sometime in the fall and I am most interested in chocolate...not so much confectionary.

←

I think that is a great idea. Too many panned products use not so great chocolate. The challenge will be getting the fund raisers to put out the money for the good stuff. Although I suppose there is room to make products of differing quality for different budgets. Your time is still going to cost the same however.

Have you had a chance to look at the demo that I did on chocolate panning a while back? Thread here. It won't answer all your questions, but it will at least help you decide what questions you need answered. Don't hesistate to ask me anything as you play with it.

I hope you are going to start a thread about your chocolate shop as you go through the process of opening etc, we all love Tammy's thread about starting her chocolate business, it's great to live the dream vicariously.

←

Kerry

Most recipes for chocolate covered macadamia nuts want you to caramelize the nuts. Do you add a hot syrup mixture to the nuts while in the drum or do you do this in the oven?

Mark

←

The only caramelized nuts I've coated were already coated when I put them in the pan. I suspect if you poured the hot syrup into the pan you'd be cleaning it until the cows come home. So I'd do them in the oven first, then completely cool them before panning.

By the way Pamela won a great looking little coating pan on e-bay yesterday. Copper pan, household current. Looks like it will be a perfect experimental pan for her.

←

How much did it sell for? Do you have the link? What catagory was it in. I never see them for sale. The only one I saw was the one you alerted me too. I found it.

Mark

Edited June 2, 2007 by mrose (log)

[Kerry Beal]

How much did it sell for? Do you have the link? What catagory was it in. I never see them for sale. The only one I saw was the one you alerted me too.

Mark

←

Here is a link to it while it lasts. I have a catagory 'coating pans' that I check every so often. I'll let you know when I see another. You'll notice that there are a number of big ones in the 'buy it now' section.

Another source is www.rabin.com, they auction off candy plants and sometimes there might be a lab sized pan.

[Mary F]

Kerry, glad it helped to use the fork! great idea to split it after dipping, it does look pretty that way. do you have any problems with it softening after you chop it?

Prairiegirl, great idea. Where are you located? Hopefully, your product will make it to the Northwest, as my kids are coming in to fundraiser ages! sick of the bad product I have to buy!!

[Kerry Beal]

Kerry, glad it helped to use the fork!  great idea to split it after dipping, it does look pretty that way.  do you have any problems with it softening after you chop it?

←

I'm hoping if I keep it in airtight containers that it won't be a huge problem.

[gap]

Hi Kerry,

I'm back on the Boards after a week away on holiday. I know I'm late in getting in but thanks for starting this post - great stuff.

[minas6907]

Bumping topic!

Kerry, where did you get those jelly bean centers before you coated them? They look a little too perfect, you didnt mold those yourself did you? I was just curious about this, I've seen this thread before, but never occurred to me where those jelly bean center came from. Nice panning demo btw, I love it.