The Comprehensive Home-Made Fondant Discussion: Making, Using, Storing

[Capouch]

1 hour ago, curls said:

Are you currently starch molding? Fondant fillings can be deposited into chocolate molds... might be easier and less messy than dealing with trays of corn starch. Good luck in your chocolate and confection journey. Please post some photos of your work.

 

I have a whole setup that uses 9x13 cake pans as the standard "starch pan."  Molds for bon-bons, mint patties, 1/2 x 1" rectangles and a "pyramid" mold for jellied candies.  I design my molds with an online CAD program, then 3d print them.  I got 100# of molding starch from Staleys.

 

The question would be the same whether starch-printed or cast into molds: what am I doing when I heat my fondant/butter/flavorings that is causing *some* of the batches to be grainy?

 

I have an album of some of my current season's work.  Note that I don't have a good way to store what I'm making, and the pieces get bumped and otherwise misfigured from their being stored in bulk in plastic bags.

 

I make my own fondant and all fillings from scratch.  I grew the strawberries for my strawberry candy, and I dry-roast peanuts and grind them in an Old Tyme mill for my peanut butter cups and peanut butter fudge.  I do candy during the "stay inside" months and garden the rest of the year.  I love what I'm doing and constantly strive to get better at it.

 

https://photos.app.goo.gl/VofpCioJMMnpYwsb8

 

 

Edited February 3 by Capouch
Correct typo and add further info (log)

[Mjx]

The Detailed Fondant Discussion may also be helpful.

[minas6907]

@Capouch How are you making your fondant? You mentioned Grewelings book, are you using the formula from there? I've made fondant many many times, and personally have only a l experienced grainy product from agitating too soon. 

 

Since you mentioned that you make your own, how do you agitate it? Are you certain that you are waiting until the boiled syrup is 120f or below before you start agitating?

 

Edit to add a few more questions:

 

You also mentioned the inclusion of invertase, does that liquify your centers at all?

 

How large are the batches that your producing?

Edited February 4 by minas6907 (log)

[Capouch]

@minas6907 Maybe I didn't make the post clear enough:

 

The fondant is FINE after I make it; it is smooth as silk and perfect as I understand what fondant is supposed to be.

 

The problem is when I melt it and add butter and flavorings to make centers for bon-bons.  It's fine, nice and smooth, about 75% of the time.  The remaining times it has a very tongue-feelable graininess.  

 

Following advice I saw in a video I was heating to 140, but Greweling's advice is hotter, 160, so I started taking it up that high.  Two batches done that way were fine, but the most recent batch--a 160 batch--was back to having that grainy feel. 

 

And that's the twist: the fondant is FINE until I melt and mix, and it doesn't always set grainy.  But I don't know what parameter is causing it to do that.  

Edited February 4 by Capouch
Additional detail (log)

[Capouch]

@minas6907 I've been making ~3-pound batches of fondant.

 

I then melt the fondant in batches of about .75 pound; that's the quantity for one of my 9x13 starch trays.  

 

Just began using the invertase and not enough time has elapsed at present to know if it's working or not. 

 

Which is a sort of jiggled truth: I'd been using invertase for about 3 weeks, but then a few days ago realized that I had grabbed a year-old+ bottle that hadn't been refrigerated instead of the new one I got to replace it.  Bad brain fart; I mixed up the bottles when the new one came in.

Edited February 4 by Capouch
Clarify "batches" (log)

[minas6907]

Whats your formula for fondant look like, is it the one from Chocolates and Confections?

 

I do understand that your fondant is silky smooth after you make it, but if you kept that fondant in storage and didnt use it for centers, weeks later, would it also develop the same graininess?

Do you get the same result with centers if you do not add the butter?

 

When you make fondant, controlled crystallization is really everything. As your boiling your syrup, clean the sides of the pan often, more then you think you need to, and start the syrup off on a lower heat before increasing the flame to boil.

 

Have you tried increasing the amount of glucose in your formula?

 

Do you seed with previously made fondant?

 

How long does the deposited fondant need to sit for you to notice the graininess? Would it be present an hour after it cools? Or is it over the course of multiple days or weeks?

 

How do you agitate your fondant? Personally, I used to do it by hand on a slab, but now it goes into a mixer. I pour the syrup into the bowl, leave it until it cools below 120f, then start agitating with a paddle on the slowest setting. About 15 minutes ish later, the fondant will be ready, and you need to catch it before it suddenly seizes.

 

I ask about your process in making it because something along the way is causing the graininess, and other times not. Thats why I ask about agitation, how do you tell that your not agitating too soon?

 

As for starch vs molds, either will work fine, the starch wont have an effect on the crystallization of fondant. Starch has been used to mold fondants for a very long time, and still is commercially. Personally, I like to use silicone molds (especially for patties) and on occasion have done like a thinned fondant as a center for a molded bonbon, like @curls mentioned, I gave my starch imprinters away because I got tired of the process, it was just too much for me personally, I mostly used it for gummies and cordials.

 

And thats pretty cool that your 3d printing your imprinters, can you post a picture of them?

[Capouch]

8 hours ago, minas6907 said:

Whats your formula for fondant look like, is it the one from Chocolates and Confections?

Essentially, yes.  

 

8 hours ago, minas6907 said:

 

I do understand that your fondant is silky smooth after you make it, but if you kept that fondant in storage and didnt use it for centers, weeks later, would it also develop the same graininess?

Do you get the same result with centers if you do not add the butter?

 

When you make fondant, controlled crystallization is really everything. As your boiling your syrup, clean the sides of the pan often, more then you think you need to, and start the syrup off on a lower heat before increasing the flame to boil.

 

Have you tried increasing the amount of glucose in your formula?

 

Do you seed with previously made fondant?

 

How long does the deposited fondant need to sit for you to notice the graininess? Would it be present an hour after it cools? Or is it over the course of multiple days or weeks?

 

I ask about your process in making it because something along the way is causing the graininess, and other times not. Thats why I ask about agitation, how do you tell that your not agitating too soon?

 

And thats pretty cool that your 3d printing your imprinters, can you post a picture of them?

 

After that first response the UI didn't seem to allow me to answer the questions underneath each one.

 

I basically use the Greweling recipe.  Cook to 240, pour into a half-sheet pan that has been rinsed with cold water, then sprinkle with coild water.  Agitate starting at 120, last two batches I have seeded with existing fondant; before that I did not.   I agitate with a wooden spoon.

 

Fondant is tested before each time I melt, smooth as can be, always.    I even had some leftover from last spring when I started working a couple of months ago.  It was weepy, but still perfectly smooth.  I don't think it's my fondant; I think it's my technique somewhere.  And since the finished but unmelted fondant is essentially perfect, as well as a high majority of the molded batches, I haven't had the motivation to change it up.

 

All the crystals are going to melt when I melt it with the butter and flavorings, right?  I haven't ever made it without butter, but as I said in the OP, 75%+ of what I make is fine, so if the butter were doing it I would think I'd see it more often.  It seems random. . . . 

 

I usually drop the centers and then cover the next day.  Always taste one from each batch, so I noticed it immediately on this most recent grainy batch.  Three batches in a row ahead of this one were perfect, not same flavoring, but same butter and overall technique.