Jump to content
  • Welcome to the eG Forums, a service of the eGullet Society for Culinary Arts & Letters. The Society is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization dedicated to the advancement of the culinary arts. These advertising-free forums are provided free of charge through donations from Society members. Anyone may read the forums, but to post you must create a free account.

Chocolates with that Showroom Finish, 2012 –


punk patissier

Recommended Posts

yay piping!

Very nice looking. Can you share any suggestions on how to do this? I get the basic technique, but when I have tried it, the lines have come out broken, especially on the sides of the mold. If you had used a flat dome or hemisphere kind of mold, I would understand how it worked, but you have one with fairly steep sides. I am guessing you held the tip of the piping bag very close to the mold. And perhaps the viscosity of the substance used (dark chocolate?) is also a key.

In any event, I have wanted to do this, but every time I have tried, I have ended up with random splotches on the mold.

Jim

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi Jim,

thanks for the comment - starting piping in the middle of the mold and drag the piping bag along the surface of the mold out towards the rim. In this case, I had to tilt the mold as I was piping so that I could pipe up the side nicely. It's hard to describe without seeing! Basically, you're piping big Y shapes for that one, and the point where the lines in the Y intersect is where I started from.

Chris

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi Jim,

thanks for the comment - starting piping in the middle of the mold and drag the piping bag along the surface of the mold out towards the rim. In this case, I had to tilt the mold as I was piping so that I could pipe up the side nicely. It's hard to describe without seeing! Basically, you're piping big Y shapes for that one, and the point where the lines in the Y intersect is where I started from.

Chris

Chris,

So I must ask: What lies beneath this zebra-like exterior? Knowing your work, I assume the decoration must be something related to the filling.

Jim

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi Jim,

thanks for the comment - starting piping in the middle of the mold and drag the piping bag along the surface of the mold out towards the rim. In this case, I had to tilt the mold as I was piping so that I could pipe up the side nicely. It's hard to describe without seeing! Basically, you're piping big Y shapes for that one, and the point where the lines in the Y intersect is where I started from.

Chris

I imagine that took a very long time!

Steve Lebowitz

Doer of All Things

Steven Howard Confections

Slicing a warm slab of bacon is a lot like giving a ferret a shave. No matter how careful you are, somebody's going to get hurt - Alton Brown, "Good Eats"

Link to comment
Share on other sites


Hello... I'm new here, but I would like to hijack this awesome thread and ask for some troubleshooting tips. When I am making molded chocolates with transfer sheets (magnetic molds) I often get ringing patterns on the top (photos attached).



I am using E. Guittard 72% couverture, and sometimes add Mycryo. Also tempering using a bain marie and the seeding method (at home, no fancy machines, I'm a hobbyist). Transfer sheets are from ChefRubber, though I also see this with other acetate from the art store (for example, the oval shapes in the photos below). I had been using the fridge to speed up filling/releasing process (until I read this thread and Grewling's books), but it happens even if I do everything at room temperature.



What causes this, and how do I mitigate it? It seems to happen even with the first pieces I make, so I don't think its simply that the chocolate is falling out of temper. It's like it shrinks at different rates and pulls away from the acetate differently at the edges.



Any help would be appreciated!



- Marianne




photo3.jpg



photo.jpg


Link to comment
Share on other sites

Welcome mirihn. Unmolding marks like this happen on smooth surfaces. It tends to be worse on lighter polycarbonate (cheaper molds) and on the acetate sheets that the cocoa butter is printed on for transfer sheets.

It's hard to eliminate entirely - but making sure the chocolate is as warm as possible in the working temperature range and leaving the chocolate in contact with the transfer overnight before pulling it off may help minimize the marks.

Do you put your molds in the fridge for a short while after making the shells to carry off the latent heat of crystallization?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guiness bon bons! Of course, one of these things doesn't look like the others!

Steve Lebowitz

Doer of All Things

Steven Howard Confections

Slicing a warm slab of bacon is a lot like giving a ferret a shave. No matter how careful you are, somebody's going to get hurt - Alton Brown, "Good Eats"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guess I need to figure out how to attach the image in the new software.

Guiness bon bons! Of course, one of these things doesn't look like the others!

G

Steve Lebowitz

Doer of All Things

Steven Howard Confections

Slicing a warm slab of bacon is a lot like giving a ferret a shave. No matter how careful you are, somebody's going to get hurt - Alton Brown, "Good Eats"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

OK. Here they are... Guiness bon bons!

Guiness Bon Bon.jpg

Steve Lebowitz

Doer of All Things

Steven Howard Confections

Slicing a warm slab of bacon is a lot like giving a ferret a shave. No matter how careful you are, somebody's going to get hurt - Alton Brown, "Good Eats"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

OK. Here they are... Guiness bon bons!

Sooo... do you ship to Canada? :biggrin:

It's kinda like wrestling a gorilla... you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is tired.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Those are just beautiful! I'd love to know how you get that application of metallic - so you mix it with something, I assume a cocoa butter based colour, finger apply then spray over it with the second colour?

cheers

Chris

Link to comment
Share on other sites

They do look awesome but he had me at Guinness... after that, they could have looked like polished moose poop and I'd still be interested. Fortunately, they don't look anything like that.

It's kinda like wrestling a gorilla... you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is tired.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

OK. Here they are... Guiness bon bons!

Sooo... do you ship to Canada? :biggrin:

No, I don't ship to Canada, but I will be at the Niagara workshop in late April. If you're nice, maybe I'll bring some. ;-)

Steve Lebowitz

Doer of All Things

Steven Howard Confections

Slicing a warm slab of bacon is a lot like giving a ferret a shave. No matter how careful you are, somebody's going to get hurt - Alton Brown, "Good Eats"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Those are just beautiful! I'd love to know how you get that application of metallic - so you mix it with something, I assume a cocoa butter based colour, finger apply then spray over it with the second colour?

cheers

Chris

Actually, it IS the cocoa butter. Gold, in fact (has that nice shiny flake).

Steve Lebowitz

Doer of All Things

Steven Howard Confections

Slicing a warm slab of bacon is a lot like giving a ferret a shave. No matter how careful you are, somebody's going to get hurt - Alton Brown, "Good Eats"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

OK. Here they are... Guiness bon bons!

Sooo... do you ship to Canada? :biggrin:

No, I don't ship to Canada, but I will be at the Niagara workshop in late April. If you're nice, maybe I'll bring some. ;-)

I didn't actually expect you to ship them to me, that was just my way of saying they sound really good. I'm hoping to make the workshop but it honestly isn't looking too good right now. Had some unexpected stuff happening the past couple months that may make it financially not a good idea right now... but I haven't given up completely yet.

It's kinda like wrestling a gorilla... you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is tired.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Two pieces to round out my menu for the next few weeks...

Bailey's Irish Cream

Photo1 copy.jpg

and Lemongrass & Coconut (I need to work on the decoration here a bit, but you get the idea)

Photo1.jpg

Steve Lebowitz

Doer of All Things

Steven Howard Confections

Slicing a warm slab of bacon is a lot like giving a ferret a shave. No matter how careful you are, somebody's going to get hurt - Alton Brown, "Good Eats"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Steve, how did you decorate your lemongrass & coconut pieces? My best guess is that you are using templates and masking off section and then airbrushing but I'd like to know what you are really doing to get those effects.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...