Cutting chocolate block

[ejebud]

I picked up an 11 pound block of Callebaut today and I want to break it down into the 10 smaller pieces as indicated by the pattern on top. What's the best way to do this? What kind of knife works best?

[RETREVR]

I never get them to break on the grid. I did one just yesterday. I suppose I could spend the time and heat up a knife (carefull, you can screw up the temper on the knife). Or use a saw or something. You might post this over in the pastry forum.

[chefpeon]

Do you care how the small pieces look? If you don't require straight edges or any kind of uniformity, just doing a cut on the grid with your standard chef's knife should do the trick.

Slowly ease the knife into the block where you want to make your cut, and rock your knife

back and forth to create a straight deep cut......that would work best I think.

Also, if your block is a bit on the warm-room temperature side, you'll have a much easier

time of it. The cooler the block, the more jagged your pieces will be.

So I must ask, you want to do this because.........?

[ejebud]

So I must ask, you want to do this because.........?

←

Edited March 29, 2005 by ejebud (log)

[Sebastian]

Being the delicate worker that I am, I usually use a hammer. It works quite well 8-)

[CurlySue]

I agree with the hammer. If you put a bench scraper down along the grid on the chocolate and whack it lightly with a hammer a few times, then continue to move it down along the grid so that you hammer into it evenly, eventually it will break pretty close along those lines.

[Patricia Austin]

I learned a perhaps unusual and very effective way to break up chocolate blocks in my early baking days. This is a tried and true technique which I highly recommend. The person who taught me was Jeff Hamelman, the author of the a new bread baking book (sorry I cannot remember the name of his book, I am more into pastry than bread). I do not know if he invented this technique or if it was passed down to him by his teachers of that time.

Here we go:

Wrap block of chocolate in two heavy duty plastic bags.

1. Step outside where there is a solid area of cement or blacktop (sidewalk, parking lot, etc.)

2. Holding chocolate with both hands, lift block just level to or above your head.

3. With a full downward swing, smash the block flat down onto the pavement.

This is particularly pleasurable if you are in the mood to yell which helps break the chocolate if sounded simultaneously with the throwing down of the block.

I usually do two smashes and skip happily back to the kitchen.

Good luck!

Patricia

[nicolekaplan]

patricia's method works for dry ice as well