Sourcing Couverture in a Warm Climate

[Bentley]

Where are the warm weather folks buying their chocolate???  I'm in SW Florida.  My last order of about 12Kg of chocolate from Chocosphere cost about $70 to ship because it had to be packed in insulated boxes and shipped next day air.

 

Now I'm looking to order about 20kg.  Chocosphere doesn't have what I need in stock, and I'm getting shipping quotes from $150 to $170 and about $330 of chocolate.  

 

I'm not a professional kitchen or retail shop, just a home chocolatier that makes a lot of chocolates - so I don't think I can buy form a lot of the wholesaler/food supplier places.  Is there any where I can buy Cacao Barry or Guittard without getting killed?

Edited October 1, 2016 by Bentley (log)

[curls]

I have not ordered from them but Pastry Chef Central (http://www.pastrychef.com/Ingredients_c_7.html) has offices in Boca Raton & carries Cacao Barry. Anyplace in Florida is within their 1 day shipping range and they ship by UPS Ground.

[Kerry Beal]

Qzina is in Miami. They sell to non professionals (at least in Canada they do). They are also associated with ChefsWarehouse now if I'm not mistaken.

 

 

[ChocoMom]

I've had great success with WorldWideChocolate.  They cold pack in a foam cooler, and it usually arrives in 2 days. The big bonus is: they frequently run free shipping specials. 

[Bentley]

Thanks for the ideas.  Worldwide chocolate looks to have some good coupons, although they are out of stock on a couple things i need.  I'll keep an eye on them.  I also like you they sell .5 oz trial packs of a lot of different kinds of chocolates.  Pastry Chef Central looks promising as well, especially if I can use ground shipping.  Qzina is priced about 20% higher than everyone else (at least for consumer retail pricing).

 

 

Edited October 1, 2016 by Bentley (log)

[RobertM]

Pastry Chef Resource, in Orlando!

http://www.pastrychefresource.com/

 

[gfron1]

Albert Uster was my go-to during the hot months. Prices are decent and include shipping - they were very good about hot weather shipping. Chocolate is decent.

[keychris]

To play devil's advocate: does it matter if it's warm? You're going to melt the chocolate anyway

[pastrygirl]

1 hour ago, keychris said:

To play devil's advocate: does it matter if it's warm? You're going to melt the chocolate anyway

 

If you temper by seeding or incomplete melting, then you need tempered chocolate to provide your seed.  Chocolate that has melted and re-solidified without being tempered won't make good seed. 

 

But if you're going to melt it and make brownies, then no, it doesn't really matter.

[Kerry Beal]

Also if you buy callets it's a challenge to get the big honking block out of the bag. I've driven north with bags in the van and had them melt - 5 years ago it would have been a seed problem for me - this year it was just the giant block and me with no ice pick!