About 10X and other powdered sugars

[xxchef]

I've started stocking up on ingredients for our upcoming crazy Holiday candy making season and have been somewhat blown away by 10x (confectioner's) sugar price differences in my area. We're way out in the boonies of northern AZ but I can get one of the major food service suppliers in the state (Shamrock Foods) to deliver to a country store only 6 miles from our ranch for a small delivery fee (beats the heck out of the 4+ hour trip to Tucson or Phoenix). Shamrock 10x sugar in the 50 lb bags is currently at $0.98/lb so I've been looking around. If I go to Flagstaff (2.5 hours) I can get it for around $0.69/lb in 4# bags from Sam's Club. In looking around a little more I discovered that my nearest Restaurant Depot (in Tucson) has the 50 lb bags for $0.47/lb, less than half the Shamrock price! These are all for the exact same product (C&H pure cane sugar) too.

Is this pricing difference common in other areas? I'm going to save about $400 after expenses in the next 2 months by having somebody run down to Tucson for my sugar. It's crazy.

[Edward J]

Pricing is always crazy, even if it's the same brand. I deal almost exclusively with a bakery ingredient supplier and his prices can get out of whack as well, usually with sugar and flour. What I was told, was that the purveyor locked in a price for a certain time frame from the mnfctr, and now has to stick with that priace. If this is true or not, I'll never know....

[Mjx]

I don't know whether or not this is still true today, but at one point there was a sugar floor, below which sugar prices would never drop; if this is stil the case, this floor may have just undergone one of its periodic rises.

(Disclaimer: I know very little about this sort of thing, BUT the 'sugar floor' thing is one of perhaps three things that stuck in my mind from the compulsory business course I took as an undergrad.; it seemed so implausible, I actually researched it at the time.)

[Franci]

After burying my head under the sand I need to solve a problem. Powder sugar that melts  on top of the cakes affecting their appearance even it they taste still very good...

I know about the sucre neige out there. I've not tried all brands but I remember trying with King Arthur Flour without a lot of help.

 

The problem that is preventing me to go out and look for all other brands is:

• a lot of brands have gluten, and I want a GF product
• it's full of too many other ingredients for my liking

 

So, I'd like to come up with another solution.

 

Could you follow my thoughts. Not an easy task, my husband can testify, I'm not always a logical person

 

1. Making my own non melting sugar.

Even with a Thermomix, Hotmix, I could not make a 10X grind. But it did not stopped me from trying in the past with some caster sugar that I ground as finely as possible with my tools, added some cornstarch and white chocolate, in place of cocoa butter,  and some clarified butter if  remember. It was a while ago. I don't remember working too well but I should give it another go.

Even if it's not gluten free I just bought the Indian Tree Fondant  & Icing just to see how effective it is.

 

Now someone passed me a formula for hydrophobic sugar,  it calls for:

powdered sugar, dextrose, cocoa butter and vanilla alcohol.

 

Do you have a source for 10X at least that doesn't contain starch? I saw that King Arthur has glazing sugar that has maltodextrin, not dextrose. Will that still work? And anyway what's the function of dextrose here?

I could also try to spray very lightly with cocoa butter, let dry  and sprinkle the sugar on top...should have to test it. 

 

2. Finding a different glaze. I like the pattern on my cake, I'd like to keep it. Something very light that I could spray on top of the cake and stay put if the cakes get shipped.

 

Any thought you have to spare?

 

 

 

 

[Tri2Cook]

The problem is, commercial or homemade, without the aid of additives, sugar, especially a very thin layer of super-fine sugar, is going to struggle when confronted with moisture... which is going to happen when in contact with a cake. Maybe try a light spray of white chocolate through your stencil and see how it looks? That wouldn't increase sweetness any more than the sugar and won't taste like chocolate. If it's sprayed lightly enough, it won't taste like much of anything when eaten with the cake. Also less expensive long-term than coating every cake with cocoa butter would be. I have no idea how well it would work, never tried it, but it'd be a cheap experiment to try it on one cake and see what happens.

[pastrygirl]

Your website looks great!  Was it custom built from scratch or did you use a template?

 

21 minutes ago, Franci said:

I could also try to spray very lightly with cocoa butter, let dry  and sprinkle the sugar on top...should have to test it. 

 

I think that could work. 

 

Does it have to be sugar?  Try microlane-ing white chocolate over your stencil and see how it sticks and how it looks. 

 

I suppose you could also decorate with almond flour or a mix of almond flour, powdered sugar, and/or cocoa butter/white chocolate.   You can even get a white cocoa butter such as Chef Rubber white diamond if you prefer the pure white look of powdered sugar.

 

[Lisa Shock]

This is probably not what you want, but, just in case, I will mention waxed sugar crystals. They will stay intact over time, and they stand up to being baked. (they can be used as a muffin-topping, they stay sparkly) Bakery wholesalers sell it much more cheaply than Amazon. My thinking is, you could make a cocoa butter based icing with white color and flavor -just no sugar. Drizzle the icing, then sprinkle with the sugar.

[MelissaH]

Stella Parks did an article about the differences between organic and conventional confectioner's sugar not long ago. If you haven't seen it already, there may be some new information for you, although it's probably not going to solve your problem.

[Kerry Beal]

Did you see this? Perhaps replace chocolate with cocoa butter.

[Tri2Cook]

4 minutes ago, Kerry Beal said:

Did you see this? Perhaps replace chocolate with cocoa butter.

Interesting. Doesn't completely eliminate the starch but it greatly reduces it and it solves her gluten free request. Sounds a lot easier than spraying chocolate or cocoa butter through a stencil for each cake too.

[Kerry Beal]

http://www.frenchfoodexports.com/confectioners-sugar-sucraneige.html Ingedients - dextrose, sucrose, veg fat and anti caking agent.

[Kerry Beal]

Ingredients: Dextrose (corn and/or wheat), corn starch, hydrogenated vegetable fat, anti-caking agents (magnesium stearate, calcium phosphate), flavouring.
Traces of wheat and oat.

[JeanneCake]

Could you investigate this product? I don't know if European sugar producers use starch in the powdered sugar or not; it's worth checking out.

http://www.coupletsugars.com/page/coated_icing_sugar/f1.html

 

And,thinking out of the box, you could use this fondant powder instead of the dusting sugar, so long as it doesn't melt in humid conditions..... (the glucose has virtually no traces of gluten even though it comes from wheat starch - I ran into this with Pate de Fruit,and it turns out glucose is ok.

 

http://www.coupletsugars.com/page/fondant_powder/f1.html

[Franci]

8 hours ago, Tri2Cook said:

Maybe try a light spray of white chocolate through your stencil and see how it looks?

 

I should try that.

 

7 hours ago, pastrygirl said:

Your website looks great!  Was it custom built from scratch or did you use a template?

 

 

I think that could work. 

 

Does it have to be sugar?  Try microlane-ing white chocolate over your stencil and see how it sticks and how it looks. 

 

I suppose you could also decorate with almond flour or a mix of almond flour, powdered sugar, and/or cocoa butter/white chocolate.   You can even get a white cocoa butter such as Chef Rubber white diamond if you prefer the pure white look of powdered sugar.

 

 

Thanks Pastrygirl. It's squarespace, so it's a template. Glad you like it! And thanks for the suggestion. I'm adding to the list

 

6 hours ago, Lisa Shock said:

This is probably not what you want, but, just in case, I will mention waxed sugar crystals. They will stay intact over time, and they stand up to being baked. (they can be used as a muffin-topping, they stay sparkly) Bakery wholesalers sell it much more cheaply than Amazon. My thinking is, you could make a cocoa butter based icing with white color and flavor -just no sugar. Drizzle the icing, then sprinkle with the sugar.

Added, thanks

 

4 hours ago, MelissaH said:

Stella Parks did an article about the differences between organic and conventional confectioner's sugar not long ago. If you haven't seen it already, there may be some new information for you, although it's probably not going to solve your problem.

 

Yes, I tried in the past the organic confectioners sugar, A pain to sift! But it wasn't until this morning when reading all the labels on the sugar in Whole foods that I noticed it had tapioca starch! 

 

3 hours ago, Kerry Beal said:

Did you see this? Perhaps replace chocolate with cocoa butter.

 

This is very similar to what I tried in the past, using white chocolate and was already thinking of replacing with  cocoa butter. On the list

 

3 hours ago, Kerry Beal said:

http://www.frenchfoodexports.com/confectioners-sugar-sucraneige.html Ingedients - dextrose, sucrose, veg fat and anti caking agent.

 

That doesn't work, I already found it on the web, it has wheat: here

3 hours ago, JeanneCake said:

Could you investigate this product? I don't know if European sugar producers use starch in the powdered sugar or not; it's worth checking out.

http://www.coupletsugars.com/page/coated_icing_sugar/f1.html

 

And,thinking out of the box, you could use this fondant powder instead of the dusting sugar, so long as it doesn't melt in humid conditions..... (the glucose has virtually no traces of gluten even though it comes from wheat starch - I ran into this with Pate de Fruit,and it turns out glucose is ok.

 

http://www.coupletsugars.com/page/fondant_powder/f1.html

That's very interesting. I'll email tomorrow to find out about gluten! thanks

Edited June 5, 2017 by Franci (log)

[Kerry Beal]

49 minutes ago, Franci said:

 

 

That doesn't work, I already found it on the web, it has wheat: here

 

If you make your own - you could use starch from corn and dextrose made from corn if that would avoid the wheat issue. Or are you trying to avoid all starch? Also - even though it comes from wheat it might not contain gluten.

Edited June 5, 2017 by Kerry Beal (log)

[Franci]

Here is another question. I know you have a beautiful topic there on chocolate sprayers but I don't have one. What is your recommendation in my case for spraying cocoa butter/white chocolate or a glaze. Don't want to invest on $400 right now, just for trying what can I use?

[Kerry Beal]

19 minutes ago, Franci said:

Here is another question. I know you have a beautiful topic there on chocolate sprayers but I don't have one. What is your recommendation in my case for spraying cocoa butter/white chocolate or a glaze. Don't want to invest on $400 right now, just for trying what can I use?

Others will address this better - but I think one of the Wagners is what you want.

[Tri2Cook]

6 hours ago, Kerry Beal said:

Others will address this better - but I think one of the Wagners is what you want.

I'd agree 100% with that. At the very least, to get started and see if it works for you or you like messing with it. They're not too expensive and do the job just fine for most pastry work not requiring fine detail. I have over 12 years on mine with no issues and no temptation to upgrade to something more fancy. The biggest issue with the Wagner is making sure you use something, even just a cardboard box, as a spray booth because the overspray isn't horrible but isn't entirely insignificant either. I generally set the sprayer in container of hot-ish water so that it's container is mostly submerged while I'm melting chocolate and cocoa butter for spaying. Then I just put the filled sprayer back in the hot water whenever I'm not spraying to keep things flowing nicely.

[Franci]

Very useful,  @Tri2Cook! Do you have also a model n to recommend? Thanks!

 

[Jim D.]

1 hour ago, Tri2Cook said:

I'd agree 100% with that. At the very least, to get started and see if it works for you or you like messing with it. They're not too expensive and do the job just fine for most pastry work not requiring fine detail. I have over 12 years on mine with no issues and no temptation to upgrade to something more fancy. The biggest issue with the Wagner is making sure you use something, even just a cardboard box, as a spray booth because the overspray isn't horrible but isn't entirely insignificant either. I generally set the sprayer in container of hot-ish water so that it's container is mostly submerged while I'm melting chocolate and cocoa butter for spaying. Then I just put the filled sprayer back in the hot water whenever I'm not spraying to keep things flowing nicely.

 

A little off the topic, but you mentioned your Paasche airbrush in another thread. So you use the Wagner just for pastry work?

[Tri2Cook]

2 hours ago, Franci said:

Very useful,  @Tri2Cook! Do you have also a model n to recommend? Thanks!

 

I have the model 165 (4.8 gallons per hour) but like I said, I've had it for over 12 years. I honestly have no idea what the current models are.
 

1 hour ago, Jim D. said:

 

A little off the topic, but you mentioned your Paasche airbrush in another thread. So you use the Wagner just for pastry work?

Yeah, just pastry work. I use it for velveting and spraying glazes. I've never tried using the Wagner for chocolates.

[Merry Berry]

Are you looking for a GF product or one without any starch?  Because just regular 10x is (usually) just the sugar and cornstarch.  Are you worried that cornstarch or tapioca might have traces of wheat in it?  I do not know of any brands that have wheat gluten in them.

 

I am surprised you could not get a good consistent product from using your thermomix.  Those things can pulverize anything to dust haha.  Now you have me wanting to try it to see if we can't fine sift it a couple of times halfway through to separate the larger hard to grind crystals.

 

 

[Franci]

Hi @Merry Berry I am looking for a product without wheat. But I'd like to try to experiment making my own non melting sugar and some of the formulas I have suggest a powdered sugar with no starch added. The powdered sugar I get from the thermomix is more like a 6x than a 10X. Surely I'll use it to see if the formulas work for me.

[Kerry Beal]

1 hour ago, Franci said:

Hi @Merry Berry I am looking for a product without wheat. But I'd like to try to experiment making my own non melting sugar and some of the formulas I have suggest a powdered sugar with no starch added. The powdered sugar I get from the thermomix is more like a 6x than a 10X. Surely I'll use it to see if the formulas work for me.

@Franci - I was able to get powdered sugar with my Sumeet much finer than the Tmx when I was doing my nib to bar experiments. Perhaps you just need another toy! I'll run some trials in the basement after the child is in bed (it's a noisy toy). 

[Kerry Beal]

 

Sugar powdered in Sumeet and a very small amount of white chocolate added and ground in Sumeet as well. Just sugar on the right, treated sugar on the left.

 

 

About an hour later.

 

Not sure about the dextrose used in a lot of these non dissolving sugars - from my reading I think dextrose is more hygroscopic than sucrose. More fat would probably increase the stability.