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36 minutes ago, JeanneCake said:

I am clearly doing something wrong - I bought a case of cocoa butter three or four weeks ago from AUI, powered up the EZ and left two containers in for 24 hours.  Very lumpy so left it in another day.  Still lumpy.  Took them out, and forgot to put them back in for the day so the  next day they went back in - still very seed-y, lump-y looking.  No change after 24 hours.  In desperation I melted it all out (took the CB to 93dF) put it back in to see what would happen.  (I haven't changed the default temp setting, it's at 33.8)  I've lost track of how long it's been in there but this is what it looked like at the end of the day  yesterday.  These *$&%^ chocolate bombs are killing me - I don't know how to temper chocolate to begin with and learning on a curve during a holiday season in the midst of a pandemic is probably not the best time to learn something new   And I am learning that working clean when working with chocolate is simply not possible as a novice 🤣.

 

What am I doing wrong?  Should I have melted the CB to a higher temp? Or just wait longer?

 

Edited to add: I don't really want to bother Kerry with such a trivial question because she's busy saving our lives in the pandemic so I'm hoping someone else has had this issue and can tell me what worked for them.

This is the sort of thing I hope to be bothered for!  You'd laugh like my admin does when she hears me on the phone and says "that was a chocolate issue wasn't it?". 

That looks like form VI conversion to me. Melt that out to 60º C - then let cool completely before putting back in the EZtemper. If it persists then the cocoa butter might be too far gone but often it can be rehabilitated.  If you have some good silk around that doesn't have lumps then you can seed your melted stuff when it's get's back down to 33 or so - keep cooling outside the machine though until it firms up before putting it back in the machine.

If it doesn't rehabilitate after that and still has those grainy little lumps - get your money back from AUI cause they've sold you old or poorly stored CCB. Have you got someone close by you can borrow a cup of fresh cocoa butter from in the meantime?

35 minutes ago, JeanneCake said:

I am clearly doing something wrong - I bought a case of cocoa butter three or four weeks ago from AUI, powered up the EZ and left two containers in for 24 hours.  Very lumpy so left it in another day.  Still lumpy.  Took them out, and forgot to put them back in for the day so the  next day they went back in - still very seed-y, lump-y looking.  No change after 24 hours.  In desperation I melted it all out (took the CB to 93dF) put it back in to see what would happen.  (I haven't changed the default temp setting, it's at 33.8)  I've lost track of how long it's been in there but this is what it looked like at the end of the day  yesterday.  These *$&%^ chocolate bombs are killing me - I don't know how to temper chocolate to begin with and learning on a curve during a holiday season in the midst of a pandemic is probably not the best time to learn something new   And I am learning that working clean when working with chocolate is simply not possible as a novice 🤣.

 

What am I doing wrong?  Should I have melted the CB to a higher temp? Or just wait longer?

 

Edited to add: I don't really want to bother Kerry with such a trivial question because she's busy saving our lives in the pandemic so I'm hoping someone else has had this issue and can tell me what worked for them.

This is the sort of thing I hope to be bothered for!  You'd laugh like my admin does when she hears me on the phone and says "that was a chocolate issue wasn't it?". 

That looks like form VI conversion to me. Melt that out to 60º C - then let cool completely before putting back in the EZtemper. If it persists then the cocoa butter might be too far gone but often it can be rehabilitated.  If you have some good silk around that doesn't have lumps then you can seed your melted stuff when it's get's back down to 33 or so - keep cooling outside the machine though until it firms up before putting it back in the machine.

If it doesn't rehabilitate after that and still has those grainy little lumps - get your money back from AUI cause they've sold you old or poorly stored CCB.