Jacques Genin Caramels

[schneich]

you guys are just great :-)

@lior: i thought of that too, does anyone know if it would make sense to add cocoa butter ??

[mostlylana]

...does anyone know if it would make sense to add cocoa butter ??

Take a look at this link: https://amellacaramels.com/Ingredients.html

And then notice in the nutrition facts here: https://amellacaramels.com/Nutriton_Facts.html that the cocoa butter is listed after the butter - so more dairy butter than cocoa butter...

[gap]

for what exact reason the sodium bicarb. is added ?? it was in the original morato recipe so i put it in... does it act as some kind of catalyst to prevent further inverting of the sugar, or does it contribute to the caramel flavour ????

I was told that bicard soda aids the emulsion

[NickLam]

The trimoline from Lebbe does not lose its abilities until 130 degrees, and I will try to confirm that from any tech. sheets I can find. When you look at that French Forum recipe stating that its Jacques Genin's, it does seem a bit dodgy that the actual finishing temperatures are not there. However, the recipe says to cook it for 45 minutes, and that length of time, with the sugar and the acid from the passionfruit should cause partial inversion of the sugar shouldn't it?

This, combined with the glucose might just be the secret behind the Genin caramels. I remembered that the Mango Passion one does not have that pronounced a caramel flavour. The texture from Kerry's caramel is soft and not chewy at all, very nice, but not as unctous as Genin's. Looks like its time to replace the batteries in my digital probe and do some caramel makin' this sunday!

Wrote to Harold McGhee a few months back asking him about the science behind caramels, but have yet to get a reply :-( Now, if only someone could get Heston Blumenthal to drop him a line.......

[schneich]

nick please try to explain unctous... :-/ even though iam still at the original recipe, not the fruit one. i now did several more batches, but i seems liek my caramel is not as homogenous as i would like, when you cut it and look really close you can see its a tiny little bit grainy... dunno where that comes from... my guess is that iam over the top with the fat content...does anyone know how much fat can be put in a caramel that is cooked to 116c, the water content is the same anyway, also my caramels are quite greasy to the touch, genins are a little bit greasy as well, but only very slightly

here is my last attempt:

caramel genin type 3.0

1000g fresh cream 35%

750g sucrose

100g glucose

400g butter

2g sodium bicarbonate

i boil the cream with glucose and sugar

dry caramelize the sugar, cook to 114c add the butter

and bring it to 116c pour in frame...

[mostlylana]

Boy, they must be tasting good...

I was thinking the same thing about butter content. I'll give you a few websites to look at.

The first is a mistake someone made in making caramels that turned into a good thing. To summarize, the mistake was that the milk curdled and she strained out the curds (that would leave less fat in the caramel). To compensate, she added lots of butter! Her result was apparently the best caramels she's made.

http://www.chezpim.com/blogs/2007/11/do-it-yourself-.html

Then I came across this recipe: http://www.grouprecipes.com/8644/french-caramels.html where half and half cream is asked for with the specification of 'no substitutions'. But take a look at the amount of butter! This would be similar to the first 'mistake' recipe where a lot of the fat was strained out of the cream.

I guess in this way, you're able to add more butter (and get the butter flavour) without the added fat in the whole cream.

[NickLam]

Schneich.....haha, are you serious about the explaining the unctous part? The caramel offered no resistance to the bite and no stickiness on the teeth. Once in the mouth and mixed with saliva, it began to disintegrate into a soft, smooth and rich texture, and the flavours of the fruits are clean and clear.

The 'bite' reminded me a lot of a passionfruit 'pate de fruit' made with Gellan and unfortunately, I do not have access to these things and would love to buy them for testing, but have no money!

Here's a very 'Frenchy' style caramel that works well and gives the soft texture of caramels from that country! Feel free to make comparisons, but note the lecithin, which will probably solve graininess and greasiness issues. Just as in chocolate ganaches, the sorbitol will reduce the water activity, which in turn stabilises the whole confection and inhabits crystallization of the sugar which in turn softens the confection and gives it a better texture.

1000 Sugar

150 Glucose

70 Sorbitol Powder

700 Semi Salted Butter

4 Lecithin

1000 Cream

2 Bicarbonate

2 each Vanilla Pods

Bring cream to a low simmer with the vanilla and bicarb. Make a caramel with the sugar, glucose and sorbitol. Mix softened butter with lecithin and mix it into the caramel. Mix in the simmering cream mixture. Cook to 116 degrees and slab immediately. Add 50g of finely chopped hazelnuts at 116 degrees celsius if desired.

These fruit caramels have escaped us all for too long, I think. Schneich, thanks for reviving this issue, I now have some experiments to conduct on my day off on Sunday!

[prasantrin]

I wonder if Japanese caramels are more similar to what you're looking for. They're not sticky at all, and are very tender in a melt-in-your-mouth way. Maybe you can try looking for a recipe for nama-caramel and see if it gets you close to what you want.

[schneich]

i can confirm now that nick´s recipe is really good. it makes a very creamy smooth yet a little sweeter caramel, perhaps a little chewier than my previous trials.

whats really weird is that you need to cook this recipe to 120c, if you cook it to 116c its to soft too handle. can it be that the sorbitol

(i had no pulverized, so i used double amount liquid sorbitol) keeps more water bound even though the temperature rises ??

questions over questions :-)

[Lior]

Did you replace any cream with fruit? I will try this.

[Kerry Beal]

Tried Nick's recipe last night - took it to 120 degrees as suggested by Torsten. Still very soft - I think I'll try 121 or even a bit higher next time.

Had a hell of a time getting it out of the silicone baking pan I put it in. Nick and Torsten - what did you pour it out onto - and did you have any trouble getting it off the surface?

Cuts like a dream.

[schneich]

poured it on a silpat with aluminum rulers... i cut it with the guitar cutter... no sticking at all...

cheers

t.

[schneich]

poured it on a silpat with aluminum rulers... i cut it with the guitar cutter... no sticking at all...

cheers

t.

[cmflick]

What size slab does Nick's recipe make? Looks like it would be pretty big.

[schneich]

last trials with nicks recipe yesterday, i think we NAILED IT. i think iam safe to say now that we DID a genin clone (or at least very close) ;-)

i cooked a double recipe, pretty slow on a induction cooktop at about 1500-2200 watts, hence no scorching during the whole cooking process.

compared to nick original recipe i tripled the lecithin which i bamixed into a small portion of melted butter. since i didnt have sorbitol powder

i used liquid, and doubled the amount to cope with the excess water, the 30 vanilla was added at 115c. the whole thing was cooked to 120c.

i have no idea what emulsions do at high temperatures (maybe someone has a few cent on that) but i guess i found that if you

work the hot caramel too much after cooking (we tried to put it in some flexipan molds) or even work it after it cooled a few minutes

it has a very bad habit to break on you :-( if you let the sucker cool COMPLETELY (and by completely i mean over night covered with a layer of

baking paper in a cold pastry kitchen) its nice and smooth. the whole thing is still quite hard to handle on a guitar cutter but workable.

the lecithin seems to do its job quite well, but if someone else knows a more powerful emusifier for the job i would like to know :-/

from today these thingies are going into production... double of the recipe below makes 4 guitar size slabs and about 300 euros ;-)

cheers

t.

1000 Sugar

150 Glucose

140 Liquid Sorbitol

700 Beurre demi sel

12 Lecithin

1000 Cream 35%

4 Bicarbonate

30 vanilla extract

Edited November 10, 2009 by schneich (log)

[Lior]

Thanks. Did you use any fruit? If so, when and how much? Much luck with the production and sales!

[cmflick]

Sounds great. For those of us without a guitar, what size was each of your slabs?

[gap]

last trials with nicks recipe yesterday, i think we NAILED IT. i think iam safe to say now that we DID a genin clone (or at least very close) ;-)

schneich - thank you very much for your work on this and posting the final version as well - I will definitely give these a go!!

[mostlylana]

I, too, want to add my thanks to you Schneich for being so generous with your information. I can't wait to try your recipe!

I don't have Sorbitol in any form. Do you think it can be substituted with something else? I'm assuming the sorbitol is mainly important for keeping qualities... But I know this is a finely tuned recipe and I'm afraid of upsetting the balance!

[Kerry Beal]

I, too, want to add my thanks to you Schneich for being so generous with your information. I can't wait to try your recipe!

I don't have Sorbitol in any form. Do you think it can be substituted with something else? I'm assuming the sorbitol is mainly important for keeping qualities... But I know this is a finely tuned recipe and I'm afraid of upsetting the balance!

Sorbital is fairly easy to get in health food stores - the company "Now" makes it.

[prairiegirl]

Sorbitol: Also contact diebetic stores.

[cmflick]

Question: what's the best way to store caramels? Do they need to be individually wrapped and if so, in what? I want to try schneich's recipe.

[Kerry Beal]

Question: what's the best way to store caramels? Do they need to be individually wrapped and if so, in what? I want to try schneich's recipe.

If you don't enrobe in chocolate - then individually wrapped in 4X4 pieces of cello such as that found here.

[Lior]

Is it just me that is confused here? I understood that the famous Genin caramels we tried to reverse engineer were with Passion fruit and mango...or did this flavor become secondary to the original fantastic basic caramel recipe?

Anyhow, I have powdered sorbitol. I wonder if in other recipes that call for liquid sorbitol can be replaced with powdered -in half the weight of the liquid one. All these ingredients are incredibly hard to get here even in health food stores and there is no speciality store for diabetics!

Perhaps a list of replacements would be good. Sorbitol can be replaced with? Powdered vs. liquid? Glucose, corn syrup, inverted etc!!! I know (I hope!) that glucose and corn are interchangeable. Or should we just have all the possibilites available? Just some thoughts as these questions seem to pop up every now and then!

[cmflick]

Thanks to Nick and schneich for the caramel recipe. These are really good. I made them yesterday following schneich's recipe. I cooked them to about 122C (252F), since there had been some discussion of the caramels being really soft. I used sorbitol powder and used half the amount that was in schniech's recipe, since he said that he had doubled the amount of sorbitol since his is liquid. They are perfect. I don't know how they compare to Jacques Genin caramels since I haven't had any, but these are the best caramels that I have had. They are soft and creamy, but hold their shape, i.e, not too soft.

Edited November 24, 2009 by cmflick (log)