Confections! (2006-2012)

[mrose]

You can always determine the cost of your choclates by weight. Get an idea of the average piece weight, add up the cost of materials by weight used and get an idea of cost per piece. Then add in the packaging cost (don't forget to add in shipping costs and the cost of any labels you use - they do add up). You sale price should be 2 to 3 times this amount. I charge $22.50 for 12 truffles & $11.50 for 12 molded chocolates (they weight approx 1/2 by weight). Once you decide what you need to charge, stick to it because you know your chocolates and their quality are worth it. You have spent quite a bit of $ to get as far as you are now, you need to make a profit. People will always try to make you feel guilty that your prices are too high, remind them that you are not selling Hershey bars or Fanny Mae and these chocolates will not be sitting on a shelf 2 months from now if they do not sell. You know the price you set is fair and reasonable.

Mark

[Anna N]

Just in regards to the price, for a box of 3 I'd probably charge somewhere between $5 and $7.50.  For my boxes of 6 truffles/chocolates I usually charge $10.  For a box of 3 frogs or 3 tiramisu mice I charge $7.50 (sometime higher, depends on the audience). 

But for me selling made chocolates is not my business, teaching people to make their own is.  So I sell finished chocolates to show people what they can learn (and to help pay for my supplies).

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Yeah, Kerry brings her chocolates to you, insinuates into just loving them, then somehow, don't ask me how, turns your life upside down! Not very long ago, I lived a peaceful, hermit life where I had time to keep my house reasonably clean and tidy and my family fed and happy. Now I have no dining room - it's a chocolate factory, and no life to speak of unless it revolves around chocolate! She calls herself "The Chocolate Doctor" but it should be "The Chocolate Witch Doctor" because she totally enchants you and before you know it you are addicted to the chocolate business. And THEN you find yourself preaching the gospel.... here is my daughter's first attempt at colouring hearts for Valentine Day!

Oh Kerry, Kerry, Kerry.

[duckduck]

Those are beautiful!

[Ylee]

Amazing first attempt chocolates! They're gorgeous!

[Desiderio]

I dont have words for those hearts, simply spectacular!

[GTO]

I was astonished by those hearts anyway and to find out they were a first attempt - I'm not jealous one bit, lol. Vey, very cool, great marbled effect.

[John DePaula]

...

here is my daughter's first attempt at colouring hearts for Valentine Day! 

...

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I just have three words for you: BEAU-TI-FUL!

[Anna N]

My daughter thanks you all - now can one of you tell me how to get her off the ceiling?

I am actually amazed at what can be done with the powdered colours and melted cocoa butter without an air gun and without the expense of the premixed colours. I encourage any newbies to give it a try - who knew you could get such amazing results with such a small outlay.

[Anna N]

Sometimes the chocolate god withdraws his love! Today was one of those days. But I made a promise to Pam R to post photos of any bunnies my daughter and I made today. All of the undecorated chocolate will go back to be re-melted and the rest will be chalked up to the cost of learning. The marshmallow bars are fine - they are from Andrew Shotts book being discussed elsewhere in this forum.

The likely cause of the poor finish, I believe, is that I pushed the envelope and did not use sufficient "new" chocolate in this batch. Lesson learned!

The snails which are a double-mold are problematic because we failed to properly clean the surfaces of each side of the mold before "glueing" them together - we were rushing to finish up as we had other obligations - Chocolate Will Not be Rushed.

We also poured many shells today that we had hoped to fill tomorrow but they too will hit the chocolate recyle box.

But far from being discouraged, both of us wish we had the time today to start all over again and do it right.

[tammylc]

Anna, I have a favorite saying for just these moments - "experience is what you get when you don't get what you want."

How did you do the decoration for the tear drop bonbons in the back? Was that a transfer sheet and magnetic mold?

[Anna N]

Anna, I have a favorite saying for just these moments - "experience is what you get when you don't get what you want."

How did you do the decoration for the tear drop bonbons in the back?  Was that a transfer sheet and magnetic mold?

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You are absolutely right! Every time something goes wrong, I learn something new so no experience is ever wasted. Like Edison and his lightbulb I will soon know 1,000 + ways NOT to make chocolates! Gee I might even write a book.

Yes, that is a transfer sheet on a magnetic mold - the pattern is actually far too large for such tiny shapes but I wanted to see what sort of effect I might get and some of them turned out rather well. I am anxious to dip some chocolates and use Andrew Shotts' method of cutting up the transfer sheet into small squares to apply to dipped chocolate. I also like his method of putting coloured cocoa butter on a transfer sheet and then "texturing" it with a comb or other implement before applying to dipped chocolates.

[tammylc]

I'm also interested in experimenting with transfer sheets next. It's too bad they come in such large quantities. I remember reading in some eGullet thread about an idea to set up a transfer sheet swap - did that ever happen? Is anyone interested in getting one going?

[alanamoana]

i am interested in doing a swap, but i'm thinking that the shipping costs might be prohibitive...also, because it is cocoa butter, temperature is an issue. luckily it is winter, but even so, an ice pack or insulated packaging might be in order which would increase cost.

[BakingBee]

My daughter thanks you all - now can one of you tell me how to get her off the ceiling? 

I am actually amazed at what can be done with the powdered colours and melted cocoa butter without an air gun and without the expense of the premixed colours.  I encourage any newbies to give it a try - who knew you could get such amazing results with such a small outlay.

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Hi Anna,

I am a newbies for making chocolate. Could you tell me how to coated a chocolate just like your daughter did with the powdered colours and melted cocoa butter without air gun. Can I subsitute melted cocoa butter with'Mycro'? What is the formula? I did try to melt the Mycryo and added the powdered colours. Then brushed it on the chocolate mold and poured in the well-tempered chocolate. What turn out was the chocolate pieces were not shining. I would appreciate if you can give me some hints!

Thx!

Bakingbee

[Anna N]

My daughter thanks you all - now can one of you tell me how to get her off the ceiling? 

I am actually amazed at what can be done with the powdered colours and melted cocoa butter without an air gun and without the expense of the premixed colours.  I encourage any newbies to give it a try - who knew you could get such amazing results with such a small outlay.

←

Hi Anna,

I am a newbies for making chocolate. Could you tell me how to coated a chocolate just like your daughter did with the powdered colours and melted cocoa butter without air gun. Can I subsitute melted cocoa butter with'Mycro'? What is the formula? I did try to melt the Mycryo and added the powdered colours. Then brushed it on the chocolate mold and poured in the well-tempered chocolate. What turn out was the chocolate pieces were not shining. I would appreciate if you can give me some hints!

Thx!

Bakingbee

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I cannot help you with Mycryo as I have never used it and don't really understand what it is. We use cocoa butter and dry powder colours. We melt the cocoa butter and mix in the colours we want. To get the red, my daughter added some black and some white (for opacity) into the red until she liked the colour after trying it out on a white background. She then painted the molds quickly, let them dry and then painted them once more. A day or so later, we filled them with tempered chocolate in the usual way. I hope this helps!

[BakingBee]

Hi Anna,

Thx for your info.

According to the instruction of Mycryo, it is a frozen cocoa butter. Maybe I will do some experiment on it.

By the way, when we melted cocoa butter, do we have to care about the temperature before we added the powder colour?

Thx!

Bakingbee

[Anna N]

Hi Anna,

Thx for your info.

According to the instruction of Mycryo, it is a frozen cocoa butter.  Maybe I will do some experiment on it.

By the way, when we melted cocoa butter,  do we have to care about the temperature before we added the powder colour?

Thx!

Bakingbee

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I try to just get it fully melted but not hot. I don't take its temperature.

[Kerry Beal]

Temperature is not that important in the mixing of the cocoa butter and colours. Melt the cocoa butter (or mycryo - which is also cocoa butter), pour it out on your marble, add the powdered colour and mix well with your offset spatula, using it to 'crush' the powder. The more you mix, the more colour is released from the powder. If it starts to harden up, just heat with your heat gun or hairdryer. Scrape into a small glass jar.

When you are ready to use the colours, heat in the microwave or put your little jars in an electric yogurt maker to warm them. Try not to overheat the colours before applying them to the inside of the mold. Some sources actually suggest that you temper the colours on your marble slab, but I haven't found that to be necessary. The temperature should be between about 28 to 32 degrees C when they are applied.

Mycryo appears to be freeze dried cocoa powder, making it a powdered form which is easy to add to things.

[tammylc]

Tonight was experiment night for me. I got to try out my new Mol d'Art melter, and some colored cocoa butters I ordered.

It's not the best picture, but I was amazed at how intense the colors are - last time I did this I was using colored white chocolate. The straight cocoa butter behaved differently in the mold, it was thicker and stayed more in one place. I wasn't thrilled with the results - the red is so dark that it mostly blends into the chocolate, and looks like blood where it doesn't! And the white is rather garish as well. So I need to play with my technique some. This was done using a brush, but I'm thinking a finger smear would be better at giving me the look I want (the opposite was true with the colored chocolate). And next time I'll mix some of the white into the red to get a dark pink, which I think will show up better.

But they are really glossy and shiny, and the colored cocoa butter was really easy to use.

[Kerry Beal]

Tammy, I love the intensity of those colours. A great start. I can see you are going to have some amazing looking chocolates very soon.

Meanwhile today was big truffle day for me. We transported 5 sheet pans of truffle centers as well as all the gear to one of the preschool mom's kitchens. I had made about 300 of each center. I had about 300 raspberry hearts and just over 250 little frogs and little hearts to be added to the boxes.

I forgot to take any pictures until after we were packing up. Too busy juggling. But we got it all done in an amazingly short time. I arrived around 9 am. The first shift came about 9:30. We had dipped and decorated all the truffle centers by about 12:30. The second shift came at noon and started packaging. By 1:30 all 250 boxes were packed and ready to go. The second shift came with a whole herd of kids, they were everywhere. Underfoot, on the chairs - all wanting to help, or eat the chocolate. I was getting a little snappy by the end.

The bonus this year? I didn't have to sell any!

Some of the 250 boxes.

[alanamoana]

[...]And next time I'll mix some of the white into the red to get a dark pink, which I think will show up better.

But they are really glossy and shiny, and the colored cocoa butter was really easy to use.

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great job tammy! i think you'll find that you can't really get too dark a pink by mixing red with white. i thought i could and it sort of ends up a muddled color that you won't like too much. maybe you'll have better luck that i did.

how are you enjoying your melter?

and kerry, such nice packaging, and chocolates. i hope everyone appreciates all the work you do for them. this was a donation, right? you have more energy than i can imagine.

[Desiderio]

Very cool Tammy . I am sure you are having fun with the new toys

Ahh Kerry , wonderfull display, and what it makes it even more wonderfull is the cause and your great heart. I really hope to be able to do some found raise or donations , soon , this is one of my goal in all this chocolate making.

Great great job

[Desiderio]

Some of my first Valentine production.Actually this past friday I think I did close to 600 pc , plus 300 saturday afternoon.need to finish the packaging , wich is the longest part , helppp!

Gotta play too meanwhile

Edited January 29, 2007 by Desiderio (log)

[alanamoana]

vanessa, you are completely pazzo!!! what great chocolates!

everyone is working so hard...i forgot completely about valentine's day

[tammylc]

[...]And next time I'll mix some of the white into the red to get a dark pink, which I think will show up better.

But they are really glossy and shiny, and the colored cocoa butter was really easy to use.

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great job tammy! i think you'll find that you can't really get too dark a pink by mixing red with white. i thought i could and it sort of ends up a muddled color that you won't like too much. maybe you'll have better luck that i did.

how are you enjoying your melter?

I like it. Still getting the hang of using it, but it's definitely nice to be able to do other things while my chocolate is melting!

Sad to hear that about the colors. I hope I can manage to tone it down just a little bit without getting too muddled.