Liqueur Cordial Molds

[tmriga]

A friend of mine wants to do a '60's Kitsch party in September as a fundraiser for a local charity. It will be a backyard barbecue theme, 60's clothing and all. He asked me if I could make some chocolate liqueur cordials in the little chocolate bottles that he remembers his parents "scarfing down in his childhood." He doesn't want them more than 2 inches tall.

I read the links on making the cordials, but saw no information on where to get the molds. What I found online were those thin plastic half-bottles that must be put together. Can anyone recommend a more professional mold to work with? I don't care if I have to order it from overseas, as long as it's sturdy.

Thanks in Advance!

Theresa

[lebowits]

The traditional way of doing this is with a starch box. This is a box filled with a starch/confectioners sugar mix. Impressions are made in the starch which are then filled with the liquor/sugar solution. The solution forms a sugar crust and these pieces are then dipped in chocolate.

Another way would be to find a silicon flexi mold. You might check with Tomric Plastics or Chef Rubber. I have never done cordials this way and suspect that there might be a lot of breakage as the uncoated pieces can be very fragile.

A friend of mine wants to do a '60's Kitsch party in September as a fundraiser for a local charity.  It will be a backyard barbecue theme, 60's clothing and all.  He asked me if I could make some chocolate liqueur cordials in the little chocolate bottles that he remembers his parents "scarfing down in his childhood."  He doesn't want them more than 2 inches tall.

I read the links on making the cordials, but saw no information on where to get the molds.  What I found online were those thin plastic half-bottles that must be put together.  Can anyone recommend a more professional mold to work with?  I don't care if I have to order it from overseas, as long as it's sturdy.

Thanks in Advance!

Theresa

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[lebowits]

I gave this additional thought last night and now believe that the flexi molds might not work so well. The starch/sugar mixture could play an important role in the exterior crystalization of the pieces. Further with the pieces already being so fragile, they would very likely not survive the flexing of the molds to eject them.

[Kerry Beal]

Here is the mold at Chocolat-chocolat. But not sure how you will fill it!

[David J.]

Here is the mold at Chocolat-chocolat.  But not sure how you will fill it!

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I would "drill" a small hole in the bottom with a warm rod and stand them upside down in a bowl of rice. Then fill it with a squeeze bottle, slap a little chocolate on a piece of parchement and place over the hole.

[Kerry Beal]

Here is the mold at Chocolat-chocolat.  But not sure how you will fill it!

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I would "drill" a small hole in the bottom with a warm rod and stand them upside down in a bowl of rice. Then fill it with a squeeze bottle, slap a little chocolate on a piece of parchement and place over the hole.

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I suppose you could fill the same way with fondant containing invertase.

[lebowits]

Here is the mold at Chocolat-chocolat.  But not sure how you will fill it!

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If you were willing to use a starch box, you could cast plaster into the mold and fasten them to a semi-circular "rod" to use for imprinting the starch. This would give you the spaces to fill with the liquor/sugar solution which would crystallize enough to dip.

[Kerry Beal]

Here is the mold at Chocolat-chocolat.  But not sure how you will fill it!

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If you were willing to use a starch box, you could cast plaster into the mold and fasten them to a semi-circular "rod" to use for imprinting the starch. This would give you the spaces to fill with the liquor/sugar solution which would crystallize enough to dip.

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I've always been a little hesitant to put plaster in a chocolate mold - I suppose it would wash out - I wash plaster out of my clothes all the time from casting material. The last time I made starch moguls I used something like Fimo that hardens in the air.

[tmriga]

I have an idea I want to throw at all of you.

Are you familiar with wedding bubbles? Those little bottles of bubble liquid with wands, that are used instead of throwing rice?

I was thinking about getting some of them, sanitizing them, and then using them to cast a silicone 2-piece mold with a bottom fill to it.

Silicone is expensive. Does anyone know of a reasonable source for it? This idea may take me a while to get done because of the cost of the silicone.

I was thinking of placing a faux pearl in the corners of the bottom half, and maybe between the bottles themselves, to use for matching the seams up.

Opinions always welcome.

Thanks to all who have replied already -

Theresa

[mrose]

Here is the mold at Chocolat-chocolat.  But not sure how you will fill it!

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I would "drill" a small hole in the bottom with a warm rod and stand them upside down in a bowl of rice. Then fill it with a squeeze bottle, slap a little chocolate on a piece of parchement and place over the hole.

←

Don't you have to put the syrup into mold at a fairly high temp to avoid crystallization, this would melt chocolate. I think this is why it is done in starch molds. I have looked quite a bit for bottle type objects to stamp into starch. I have not had much luck. The closest I have come to something that looks like bottles, is a tiny bowling set that was used for kids party favors. I keep on looking in miniature doll house shops hoping to find something.

[Lior]

Maybe this is a good lead. It was on the ecole forum:

here

and

here

[Kerry Beal]

There is food grade silicone available - I used it to make the mold for my chocolate groundhog here.

[David J.]

I have filled chocolates with liquor in all these ways and I have even made silicone molds for plaster, chocolate, and breakaway "glass" bottles as a play prop.

Pouring liquor into already cast chocolate bottles would be the best looking and easiest method by far.

Starch molding can be done, but it's involved, messy, and you would need a really deep box as the only flat surface on your bottle is the bottom. That means the starch box has to be about 3" deep to have the top end down for a 2" bottle. Making all the plaster bottle forms to push into the starch would take time and be an added expense. You would need silicone to cast around your bottle form (which you would have to find first), then mix and cast lots of plaster copies, throwing out those that have bubbles on the surface. You then have to heat the starch each time, mix the syrup, pour, sift starch on top, then turn the box after a couple hours and hope that none of the bottles break and pour liquid all over. Then you dig through the starch for the finished sugar bottles and brush them off, getting starch everywhere. I just did that for small cones and it took me a week to get everything set to start. Then of course you have to dip every bottle that you make.

I'm not sure if pouring syrup directly into a silicone mold would work, but if it did it would require quite a few molds to get anywhere near the number of bottles you want. Each mold would only produce one bottle a day and that is either a large expense in molds, or a huge investment in time mixing a new batch of syrup every day. You would likely also want to embed your silicone mold in a plaster mold to prevent leakage and provide extra support for the mold and that's extra work.

If you want to use the sugar method you can just cast it in the chocolate bottle and it will form a crust all around allowing you to easily cap it. The nice thing about the chocolate bottle is that you don't have to mix the liquor with a sugar syrup. Just make a small hole in the bottom of the bottle with a warm metal rod, fill it from a squeeze bottle, then dab a bit of chocolate on a bit of parchment or acetate and slap it over the hole. It's fast and the chocolate bottle will be well shaped and glosssy. Far less effort and a much nicer looking product. You can cast all the bottles you want well ahead of time too. You could even play with painting lables on the mold in color cocoa butter to denote the flavor inside, though I would probably work them up on a computer and print them on paper to wrap around the bottles. With this method you could crank out several hundred in a few days.

[David J.]

Here is the mold at Chocolat-chocolat.  But not sure how you will fill it!

←

I would "drill" a small hole in the bottom with a warm rod and stand them upside down in a bowl of rice. Then fill it with a squeeze bottle, slap a little chocolate on a piece of parchement and place over the hole.

←

Don't you have to put the syrup into mold at a fairly high temp to avoid crystallization, this would melt chocolate. I think this is why it is done in starch molds. I have looked quite a bit for bottle type objects to stamp into starch. I have not had much luck. The closest I have come to something that looks like bottles, is a tiny bowling set that was used for kids party favors. I keep on looking in miniature doll house shops hoping to find something.

←

No, the syrup/liquor mix must be fairly cool before you cast it in starch or pour it into prepared chocolate shells. I've done both. The nice thing about prepared shells with small holes is that you don't have to mix with syrup and depend upon the sugar crust for bottoming. Instead you can just cap mechanically. I used a small chocolate disk with chocolate dabbed on to seal standard hollow truffle shells before hand dipping. A co-worker wanted liqour truffles with no sugar shell and it worked out fine. A supposed problem is that unprotected chocolate shells will eventually leak without the sugar barrier, but I didn't notice that happening before they were all gone. I wouldn't try to keep them for months, but a few weeks shouldn't be a problem.

[lebowits]

I have filled chocolates with liquor in all these ways and I have even made silicone molds for plaster, chocolate, and breakaway "glass" bottles as a play prop. 

Pouring liquor into already cast chocolate bottles would be the best looking and easiest method by far. 

Starch molding can be done, but it's involved, messy, and you would need a really deep box as the only flat surface on your bottle is the bottom.  That means the starch box has to be about 3" deep to have the top end down for a 2" bottle.  Making all the plaster bottle forms to push into the starch would take time and be an added expense.  You would need silicone to cast around your bottle form (which you would have to find first), then mix and cast lots of plaster copies, throwing out those that have bubbles on the surface.  You then have to heat the starch each time, mix the syrup, pour, sift starch on top, then turn the box after a couple hours and hope that none of the bottles break and pour liquid all over.  Then you dig through the starch for the finished sugar bottles and brush them off, getting starch everywhere.  I just did that for small cones and it took me a week to get everything set to start.  Then of course you have to dip every bottle that you make.

I'm not sure if pouring syrup directly into a silicone mold would work, but if it did it would require quite a few molds to get anywhere near the number of bottles you want.  Each mold would only produce one bottle a day and that is either a large expense in molds, or a huge investment in time mixing a new batch of syrup every day.  You would likely also want to embed your silicone mold in a plaster mold to prevent leakage and provide extra support for the mold and that's extra work.

If you want to use the sugar method you can just cast it in the chocolate bottle and it will form a crust all around allowing you to easily cap it.  The nice thing about the chocolate bottle is that you don't have to mix the liquor with a sugar syrup.  Just make a small hole in the bottom of the bottle with a warm metal rod, fill it from a squeeze bottle, then dab a bit of chocolate on a bit of parchment or acetate and slap it over the hole.  It's fast and the chocolate bottle will be well shaped and glosssy.  Far less effort and a much nicer looking product.  You can cast all the bottles you want well ahead of time too.  You could even play with painting lables on the mold in color cocoa butter to denote the flavor inside, though I would probably work them up on a computer and print them on paper to wrap around the bottles.  With this method you could crank out several hundred in a few days.

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DavidJ assumes that you want a full 3D bottle. The most common example of liquor cordials I have seen is the "model" in Greweling's book which gives you a small cordial which is essentially a 1/2 bottle with the other side "flat". The impressions in the starch box are only about 1/2 inch deep.

The immediate problem with the starch box is making the exemplar to use in imprinting the starch.

[lebowits]

I found a pretty good description of the starch molding process here.

Thought you might like another reference.

[Desiderio]

To make imprint into the starch you could use those little bottles like gummy bears but in bottle shapes, get a stick and attach all the bottles to form a line evenly spaced out, this way you can make a printing mold and make lots of imprint fast. I think one of the important thing when making stach molds is that the starch needs to be dry!! In Italy confectioners call that kind of starch Cipria, wich means face powder you know the one that they used to use while back to cover their face with LOL. Anyway this cipria is made baking the starch on low heat in the oven for many hours untill is light dry and slightly pinkish, thats way the name also, I have never made this because is time consuming but once you have the setting you should be able to do it pretty fast. Good luck

Edited April 30, 2009 by Desiderio (log)

[Lior]

Wow- thanks! I loved that candy Making -1915!! It ried this once and failed horribly. Perhaps I will put it on my ever growing list of things to try.