How do they do that? (the bonbon thread)

[Bentley]

1 hour ago, Kerry Beal said:

Looking at some of the other things he's done in the same mold - I wonder if he lays the ring in the mold then does his decoration.

Interesting possibility.  My first thought is that the ring would either melt into the shell ( I assume it's a thin band of white chocolate colored black) or there would  be difficulty in getting the bonbon to release from the mold.    I also wonder if there owuld be issues with the ring falling out or dislocating when you flip the mold the remove the chocolate to create the shell.

[Jim D.]

Regarding the Salvatore Martone snipped ballpoint pen technique from earlier in this thread:  The pens I have don't have the apparent taper shown in his video, so they end up being a straight hollow tube. For me, it wasn't so easy a process as he makes it look. First, some of the ink got out of the pen onto my hands (wear gloves next time!). The tube was a bit too large to fit into the Grex airbrush, so I basically had to hold it in place while airbrushing. I noticed that Martone also holds the tube, but his fits into the nozzle and so is more secure. The good news: The arrangement does produce splatter. I'm not sure why lengthening the path of the cocoa butter creates splatter, but it does. The bad news: The splatter isn't reliable in size, and as soon as the tube gets some crystallized c.b. in it, the output is greatly reduced. I think technique would improve with lots of practice, and it certainly is the least messy way of producing splatter with a regular airbrush.

[gfron1]

Here's my theory. Large hole pastry tip dipped in tempered chocolate, pressed into bottom of dome mold leaving ring. Then splatter and spray.

[pastrygirl]

10 minutes ago, gfron1 said:

Here's my theory. Large hole pastry tip dipped in tempered chocolate, pressed into bottom of dome mold leaving ring. Then splatter and spray.

 

But the ring appears matte, as if it was not tempered chocolate against the mold.  Maybe a small round tool dipped in dark chocolate and applied after de-molding?

 

 

 

 

[Bentley]

Interesting things to try.  I need to up my creative thinking...you guys are amazing.  By the way, @gfron1 I saw your Valentines Day chocolates on instagram. Really nice.  I see the Asian strainer made a comeback.   

Edited February 12, 2018 by Bentley (log)

[gfron1]

1 hour ago, Bentley said:

Interesting things to try.  I need to up my creative thinking...you guys are amazing.  By the way, @gfron1 I saw your Valentines Day chocolates on instagram. Really nice.  I see the Asian strainer made a comeback.   

I'm constantly on the lookout for Asian strainer v.2.0  That one was my fennel pollen honey ganache

[keychris]

11 hours ago, pastrygirl said:

But the ring appears matte, as if it was not tempered chocolate against the mold.  Maybe a small round tool dipped in dark chocolate and applied after de-molding?

Can anyone say what mould that is? It would make it easier to work it out.

Edited February 12, 2018 by keychris (log)

[gfron1]

Tried out a couple of these recent techniques. Just quick goes while my cb was warmed up. I dipped a pastry tip in tempered chocolate for the rings. I'm more confident than before that with the right tip I could replicate exactly.

Then here's the multiple finger swirls. Less success. Also tried out the thin painters tape. Good but not good enough for me to use. I saw a video where the chef had a clear acetate looking tape. Not sure what that was.

[gfron1]

I lost sleep over this last night. While I could perfect the size of the pastry tip and the amount of chocolate on the tip when its pressed into the mold, the matte finish that @pastrygirl mentioned above is still bothering me.

So let's say that you dropped a chocolate ring into the mold. And, let's assume that you could form a ring, release it from whatever surface you formed it on, and you could move it into the mold without breaking it. Yes, that would get you the matte finish. But, that would cause problems when you go to spray because there would be a slight ridge that the spray would have to work around. I then zoomed in on my screen doing a 5x enlargement and you can then clearly see flaws in his ring.

My new conclusion - Make chocolate as normal, remove it from the mold, then take a large pastry tip or other ring, dip it in chocolate and press it onto the finished bonbon. That solves all of the problems and would give you a matte ring with no void or shadow from the spray, and would be doable (v. overly fragile).

 

I consider this mystery solved.

Edited February 13, 2018 by gfron1 (log)

[Tri2Cook]

8 hours ago, gfron1 said:

I lost sleep over this last night.

 

And that's probably part of the reason you're running a successful cafe and preparing to open your dream restaurant while Judge Smails tells me the world needs ditch diggers too. 

[dhardy123]

On 12/18/2017 at 8:45 AM, curls said:

Cool video!  I think the tool might be an embossing stylus.

Yep you were right! (ignore the 5 small dots. They were from a light)

 

Thanks

 

[keychris]

On 13/02/2018 at 11:08 PM, gfron1 said:

I then zoomed in on my screen doing a 5x enlargement and you can then clearly see flaws in his ring.

 

Nice work. I agree - in fact, when you zoom in on that front ring, the right hand side, you can see that it looks like there's actually something behind the ring, some sort of support scaffold. I would have guessed paper or acetate but I can't think of anyone that would put that on a product for consumption.

[Bentley]

1 hour ago, keychris said:

 

Nice work. I agree - in fact, when you zoom in on that front ring, the right hand side, you can see that it looks like there's actually something behind the ring, some sort of support scaffold. I would have guessed paper or acetate but I can't think of anyone that would put that on a product for consumption.

When I enlarge the photos, it doesn't look to me like it's a ring around a solid bonbon.  The part below the ring looks wider at the top than the part above the ring and the lower part also seems to be curving inwards where it meets the ring.  .  To me, it looks like the top part is a separate tier.  Maybe it's an optical illusion.  Like I said in  my original post, I can't even figure out exactly what I am seeing, much less how to recreate it.  From what I can tell on his Instagram, Giorgio doesn't ever seem to answer questions about technique, so this one may remain a mystery.  

[gfron1]

I'm standing by my last answer. It is an optical illusion - simple dome mold with a wet choco ring pressed on after everything is said and done. If you do the zoom in at 10x and look at the back bonbon you'll see the major flaws. He put his best foot forward on this one and was liberal with photoshop. 

[tikidoc]

I’m not sure if this is the right thread to share this, but I have seen a number of people posting in the past about tape that one could use to get an even, sharp stripe on bonbons. I have not seen a solution (correct me if I missed it) but I think I found the magical mystery tape. I spent some time perusing amazon and found a Scotch product called “artist tape for curves” and picked up a roll. This is the result. I’m also trying out these new cheap Amazon molds, so I took the photo before unmolding (I’m going to fill them tomorrow), in case they don’t release well. But the tape did it’s job well.

 

 

Edited February 17, 2018 by tikidoc (log)

[Jim D.]

32 minutes ago, tikidoc said:

I’m not sure if this is the right thread to share this, but I have seen a number of people posting in the past about tape that one could use to get an even, sharp stripe on bonbons. I have not seen a solution (correct me if I missed it) but I think I found the magical mystery tape. I spent some time perusing amazon and found a Scotch product called “artist tape for curves” and picked up a roll. This is the result. I’m also trying out these new cheap Amazon molds, so I took the photo before unmolding (I’m going to fill them tomorrow), in case they don’t release well. But the tape did it’s job well.

 

 

I think that is the same tape that@pastrygirl said Melissa Coppel was using. I bought it under the Martha Stewart brand, and in the thread linked to below demonstrated that I could not make it work. So please tell us exactly what you did.

 

[tikidoc]

The tape  I used.

 

it looks a lot like the tape Jim used (Martha Stewart stuff) but I don’t know if it’s the same. This tape is plastic-y, not paper, and slightly stretchy. It is easy to apply, and because of the stretch, you can even do gradual curves with it. I just pressed it onto the mold and made sure it was tightly applied, then sprayed my cocoa butter. Since I used 3 colors, all but the last color were totally set when I removed the tape, but it still came off cleanly.

[tikidoc]

I also think it would be do-able in a dome, but you would have to go very slowly, so may not be worth it. Was very simple with the half sphere. It was adherent when pressed firmly to the mold, but not so sticky that it would stick where you didn’t want it to. I just ran my fingers over the tape after application. I think this particular stuff is pretty forgiving. I messed with a bit of the tape and do not think it would leave any adhesive on the mold.

[tikidoc]

The new molds were not great - colors stuck to most of them, but here is an example of the finished bonbon with a stripe. 

Edited February 18, 2018 by tikidoc (log)

[Jim D.]

13 hours ago, tikidoc said:

The new molds were not great - colors stuck to most of them, but here is an example of the finished bonbon with a stripe. 

 

 

This look great. The stripe is still sharp after unmolding. I wish they made the tape you found in a wider size, but I could not find it. And speaking of finding the tape, it does not appear on the main Scotch site. If you do a search for it ("Artist Tape for Curves"), what comes up is "Artist Tape for Canvas," which may or may not be the same thing (of the three images provided, one of them is of "Artist Tape for Curves"--rather confusing). Also interesting is that on Amazon the "Curves" tape is listed as being 1/8" wide, but if you look closely at the image, the package says it is 1/6" wide. I think the crucial factor about the tape you found is that it is plastic and stretchy, not paper and therefore produces a sharper line.

 

What is the approximate diameter of the cavity of the mold you used?

[tikidoc]

Account to the ad for the mold, 29mm.

[Jim D.]

6 minutes ago, tikidoc said:

Account to the ad for the mold, 29mm.

Glad to hear that. My molds are 34mm in diameter. I was concerned that the narrow tape would make too small a stripe for my use, but that should be fine.

[pastrygirl]

 

Am I the only one who thinks, "mmm, chocolate leeches!" every time they see this mold? 

 

I do like this design, though.  Electric leeches!  I'm thinking splatter black, spray blue, scrape the line clean and back with yellow?

[Jim D.]

47 minutes ago, pastrygirl said:

I'm thinking splatter black, spray blue, scrape the line clean and back with yellow?

 

"scrape the line clean"?  Now there is a task for a chocolatier's minion. What tool would be used? A carefully applied ice pick? With the cost of labor on this piece, ignoring the ingredients, they must be priced around $50 each.

[pastrygirl]

4 minutes ago, Jim D. said:

"scrape the line clean"?  Now there is a task for a chocolatier's minion. What tool would be used?

 

Maybe a wooden toothpick?