Shells cracking

[Sweet Impact Mama]

Hi!

 

For some reason, I'm having trouble with my hand dipped 82% dark chocolate truffles. The truffle is made of that chocolate, and then I'm trying to dip them in 70% dark. For some reason, even tho it seems to be tempered properly. I've never run into this problem before. The chocolate I'm using for dipping works fine for caramel dipping. And I've tried doing this with both a "base coat" and without. Same issue both times. As it sets, it cracks right along the top. 

 

 

[Chocolot]

Is your ganache room temp?

[gfron1]

It might help for you to post your ganache recipe. Generally cracking is because you didn't give your ganache enough time, either as Chocolat says, temp, or possibly shrinkage as it dries out. I mention the recipe because it is also possible that you used live culture yogurt or something else that could be causing activity.

[Sweet Impact Mama]

10 hours ago, Chocolot said:

Is your ganache room temp?

Yes to this one. Kinda religious about that part. Tho, room temp in this case is about 66 degrees. 

 

[Sweet Impact Mama]

11 minutes ago, gfron1 said:

It might help for you to post your ganache recipe. Generally cracking is because you didn't give your ganache enough time, either as Chocolat says, temp, or possibly shrinkage as it dries out. I mention the recipe because it is also possible that you used live culture yogurt or something else that could be causing activity.

This was a very basic ganache, using equal parts of cream to 82% dark chocolate from the Dominican Republic. These are showcasing the unique flavor profiles of 

dark chocolates, so I used the basic proportions and technique of the Valrhona ganache making, taught in the Ecole Chocolat class, and used just enough vodka to get the emulsion to come together. It did take a bit more than I usually deal with, when using 70% or less cacao.  

The ganache was  preformed into balls,  and frozen in air-tight containers. Then thawed as needed, via 24 hours in fridge, then 24+ hours in my wine cooler at 54 degrees. Then brought up to room temp before dipping. I dipped them in the 70% version of the same brand of chocolate. The cracking happened within 8 hours of dipping. No transportation happened. The ganache is still really smooth, but is there a chance that some form of dehydration happened, that caused them to shrink back from the shell? 
 

The viscosity of this chocolate may have played a part. I'm noticing that the shells are thicker than other chocolates.  

Sorry if any of this is fuzzy or confusing. My brain is in a fog still from late night Mother's day order prep

[gfron1]

I have never heard of the alcohol technique, although since it was part of the Ecole class it must be common. Whenever I use alcohol I anticipate its evaporation (ie why some use it in pie crusts) so that would be where I would hone in on an explanation, especially since you said you used more than expected.

[Sweet Impact Mama]

Just now, gfron1 said:

I have never heard of the alcohol technique, although since it was part of the Ecole class it must be common. Whenever I use alcohol I anticipate its evaporation (ie why some use it in pie crusts) so that would be where I would hone in on an explanation, especially since you said you used more than expected.

It was an accidental method of adding "water." This was several months back. I had posted over in Ecole's forum, asking how to get it to come together. I'd added more cream than I thot necessary and it wasn't working. While trying to fix it, and waiting for answers, I ended up adding alcohol (as a preservative) and it came together all of the sudden. Kerry suggested that it was because the cream was adding more fat and the alcohol better imitated water. The general suspicion at the time was that this chocolate was so much higher in solids that I needed to balance that out.