Hi folks. I am having trouble with some of my caramels. I have a slightly chewy caramel that is slabbed, precoated w/ dark chocolate, scored then cut w/ oiled knife. I painstakingly separate each one after cutting them so they don't touch prior to enrobing (i find if they touch, they pull at one another and get misshapen). After enrobing, they hold their form nicely except that some (lately many) are cracking the exterior shell of the chocolate. Mostly they are cracking along a horizontal plane and on a couple of occasions there's a tiny dot of ooze at a corner. I don't think this is cold flow - their shape remains quite square.

Anyone else experience this? Should I just double-dip (ugh -don't want to though - I hope to avoid the extra step and thickness), or am I missing something here? Maybe just let my enrobing chocolate get a little more viscous than normal?

Also, I am slabbing caramel one day, then precoating, cutting and enrobing the next. Could this be the culprit? Does caramel need to cure longer or shorter?

Thanks for your help!

updated by @casey-hickey: 04/11/15 09:25:51

I had the same issue awhile back and found my shell was to thin. the other part of it was that it had gotten colder in my area and the chocolate was setting very quickly which basically made it shrink around the caramel. I don't precoat but everything is working well again since I warmed it up a bit and did a thicker shell. Hopefully that will help?

dirke,

that does help. i got another reply from an ecole chocolat grad and she surmised room temp as well. could be my room temp, though i dipped the other half of that same batch of caramels yesterday - kitchen was around 63-65, and they did great. BUT, i did NOT oil my knife before cutting them. seemed risky but they cut great and dipped beautifully. i will also pay stricter attention to my room temp when doing the caramels - i guess they have sharper edges than my slabbed chocolates and are more likely to poke through if the chocolate shrinks upon dipping.

best.

c.