Hi friends,I just got my first tempering machine- a Chocovision X3210 (the 10lb one). I want to use it to make my barks, which involve adding different ingredients (nuts, pretzels, etc) to the tempered chocolate. Recently I've had some issues with this- the chocolate will be perfectly tempered, I'll throw in the ingredients, stir, pour out onto sheets, and spread, and then when it sets it gets streaky and bloomed. It doesn't happen every time, but it happens enough. I started to add the ingredients at the end of the tempering process but before the chocolate is totally tempered and that seems to work better. But my question is, how can I do this with a tempering machine? I don't want to put anything but chocolate into the machine, of course. Should I warm up the ingredients slightly so they're not at room temp? Should I take the chocolate out of the machine a few degrees shy of being tempered? Any help would be appreciated!

updated by @chocolate-luv: 04/16/15 23:32:48

I have this problem sometimes when the ingredients I am adding to the choc are too cold, I would warm the ingredients you are adding slightly like you say.

So, I have a question related to this, what do you do with the bark after it has bloomed? You do you re-temper it with all the ingredients in it or do you use it for sampling (which I have seen at some shops I visited while doing research for opening my shop) I have some bark that bloomed and I don't know what to do with it. I can't bring myself to sample it because of the look of it and I don't know if it will work trying to temper it manually. Any ideas or thoughts?

It depends on a few things- if there's only a small amount that bloomed, I will usually chop it up and use it as samples. I don't think people can tell when it's chopped into pieces, and it doesn't really affect the flavor. If it's a large amount, I will melt it down and re-temper (by hand, not in the machine). This doesn't work for everything- for example, dried fruit can burn during the melting process. But for most of my barks, it's been fine.

In the machine? or only by hand?

You can make chocolate caramels, nuts, fruit and all. Also make a ganache filling.

Do you temper the chocolate before you make the ganache? I've learned that ganache needs to be made with tempered chocolate to get the proper consistency.

Thanks

Take the bloomed bark, warm it back up to melt out the chocolate, sieve it to get out the inclusions, and use the chocolate you've collected. Just watch for any needed changes in temper if you get enough oils from nuts or other sources.

Have you tried making your bark thin and sprinkling the inclusions onto it? Like mendiants, very large mendiants.