Invertase will soften a fondant center but may not necessarily prevent crystallization or give the same result in a ganache. While cooking, you may want to add a tablespoon of glucose-or any amount in small enough proportion to your recipe that it will not change the consistency much. Glucose can help prevent crystallization. Hope this helps.
A gum arabic solution is often used to seal items such as dried fruits and nuts for panning because it stops fat and moisture migration and enhances shelf life. My guess is a similar process could be used on inclusions by spraying the proper solution with a compressor onto inclusions in a panning drum, letting the solution set on items, then dropping them into your bars/bark/whatever.
Buy an Iawata, they rock. Don't get too wimpy of a compressor. The 1/3 horsepower over the 1/5, especially if you can adjust the pressure-crucial. Make sure it has a pressure chamber to hold air in reserve, keeps your flow even. Two hoses is great, especially if you can adjust the pressure of each one independently.
Your are permitted to have a label that reflects a composite value of the products inside for a mixed box. You can check out the guidelines here
http://www.fda.gov/Food/GuidanceComplianceRegulatoryInformation/GuidanceDocuments/FoodLabelingNutrition/FoodLabelingGuide/default.htm
Remember, these are not law but regulations, but it's best to try and follow as closely as possible.
Here's the key paragraph
P1. Can the Nutrition Facts label on a box containing dry noodles and a seasoning packet list the nutrients in the noodles separately from the seasoning packet? If so, must a column be included that gives the total nutrients for the noodles and the seasoning packet?
Answer: Section 101.9(h)(1) provides the option of listing nutrition information per serving for each component or as a composite value. The decision is up to the manufacturer. A column of total values is not required.
P2. What are the labeling options for products packed in an assortment that are intended to be eaten at the same time? Can the nutrient analysis for a product containing a mixture of nuts or different types of dried fruit be based on a composite of the mixture blended together?
Answer: Section 101.9(h)(1) allows the nutrition information for assortments of the same type of food (e.g., mixed nuts or mixed fruits) that are intended to be consumed at the same time to be specified for each component or as a composite value. Therefore, if it is reasonable to assume that a consumer would eat an assortment of the nuts or fruits offered, a single composite analysis may be used to determine the nutrient composition.
And what about Emmaneul Andren Gastronomy's $98 for four pralines? Jeez
You're missing a piece that should fit onto the rod, where the wheel then fits into a groove in the piece, allowing the chocolate to be brought up into the piece which has a spout opening for filling molds.
Thanks for this piece, Clay. Your doubts are highly valid ones-and they closely parallel most of the issues with many aid programs, whether they support the cocoa sector or other sectors, especially the ones funded by the US government. Most USAID funds, for example, end up going to administrative costs, highly paid consultants, per diems, air fares, etc. with usually at least 50%, if not a much higher percentage, never actually being spent in the country on the people where the aid is supposedly destined for. Most of the money ends up being spent back in the US. And just like this program, many aid programs have a 5 year or 3 year time horizon, hardly enough to make any kind of lasting impact. Maintaining sustained funding is often difficult if not impossible because ofpolitical changes, changes in the Administration, changes in the political winds, etc.
Humidity shouldn't really affect your tempering process. I work at 10,000 feet here in Quito with probably 40% or lower humidity much of the time and never had an issue.
You let it sit until dry. The reason to use untempered chocolate is in part because it will be softer and less brittle on cutting, but also because as you are spreading the chocolate and moving it around, you are helping crystallize it as it cools. So it won't be completely untempered or improperly crystallized when cutting.
It sounds like your ganache slabs are too hard and there are two possible causes; either the formulas are off making the ganache too hard when set, or your slabs (and perhaps ambient temperature) are too low, or a combination of the two. Ideally, you should be able to cut your slabs with no breakage or crumbling if your formulas are right-that being said, the slabs should be at room temperature, which should ideally be around 62-68F. The wires should go right through the ganache easily. But the ganache should be firm enough that you can pick it up with your fingers without damaging the edges. You'll know when it's right-wires cut easily, edges are clean with no crumbs/breakage, and you can still manage to pick up the cut pieces fairly easily without the edges being so soft that they squish from the slightest pressure from your fingers.
Chocolate foot should be down when cutting and very thin. I prefer to put the foot onto the silpat or sheet I'm laying my ganache down on first, then pour the ganache on top. Alternatively, you can let the ganache set, then add a thin layer with a spatula-but you get a flatter bottom if you lay down the thin layer first, then pour the ganache on top.
Thanks for the astute analysis Clay. One of the main points you make is all about marketing-the big guys have the money and voice to shout, shout, shout about how great their products, certs. etc. are, and if you say something enough times unfortunately it often becomes "truth" even though it may not be. It's going to be a long slog but for those of us who are the "little guys" with direct connections to farmers, producers, and small scale chocolatiers, we know it's the only way to go. Direct connections/relationships are the key.
I own a Prefamac 30 kg wheel machine with enrober, detailer and blower. Takes some practice to operate but am quite happy with the results I get. Sure, you do get more bells and whistles with a more expensive machine with automatic tempering, but you are going to pay $10k to $15k more. I don't have any issues with keeping the chocolate in temper as Daniel mentions; as long as you know how to work with chocolate it's pretty easy to keep temper all day. With two people operating the machine, I can do 800-1,000 pieces an hour. With the ceramic heat lamps that can be placed close to the chocolate, there is no or very little buildup on the belt or elsewhere even with the blower running.You can read more of my responses on this forum.. http://www.thechocolatelife.com/forum/topics/if-selmi-is-the-cadala...
Here's my two cents, would love to hear anyone else's technique as well...
1. you need a spreader that is just a bit wider than your entire slab, so that you can run it flush on top of the ganache frame and even out the thickness in one sweep (or several). It helps to have a little bit more ganache than what fits in the frame so that as you hit the edge, the whole top surface remains flush and you remove any extra as you hit the end of the frame.
2. not mixed well enough? not tempered? not firm enough? could be a number of things. i've had this problem too, but usually when the ganache is too soft. also, your ambient temperature needs to be just right (65f-69f) seems to work best, firm enough for it to hold together, soft enough to cut on a guitar without breaking strings.
3. maybe improperly tempered...fats will separate out if the ganache is not properly tempered (and the chocolate within) which leads me to 4.
4. I would say the 105 honey/butter mix is way too hot, should be more like 86F or so when adding, that could throw off any of the good crystals in your butter/chocolate mix if the quantity was big enough. The sequence seems kind of odd to me too-most ganaches using butter and another sweetener (honey, fondant, glucose, invert sugar) are processed by first mixing together the butter and sweetener, then adding the chocolate. You might try just combining all the butter and honey first without heating it (at room temp) then adding in the chocolate. Your mileage may vary but I think that's a better route to try.
Sounds good Clay. I can be a resource for all chocolate things Ecuador.
Jeff
Actually, like the JKV machines, with the Prefamac you temper the chocolate once and don't have to retemper throughout the day. As the chocolate thickens, you just notch up the thermostat a couple tenths of a degree to break crystal down. You can temper once and just, as mentioned by cheebs, keep an eye on it throughout the day and adjust as necessary-but not retemper. I also like that the Prefamac is built like a tank, easy to fix if necessary. I've been running mine nearly daily 2.5 years without a hitch. My Prefamac doesn't have light bulbs over the top for additional ambient heat but has ceramic heat lamps-all heat but no light.
I too agree, you're paying for more bells and whistles. As Michael Reccchiuti said to me about his Sollich enrober, the machine does nothing for you, you have to do everything for the machine. I think the final quality of your product is far more dependent on your skill as a chocolatier than anything-it's like photography, you can have the best equipment in the world and still take sucky pictures if you don't know how to use it. Or, have a lousy camera and take really great shots-if you know what you're doing. Not to say that JKVs, Hilliards, or Prefamacs are lousy-but they may require a bit more "operator" knowledge and skill.
Perhaps generally not a bad idea, if you can immediately remove your filled molds or what have you to a much cooler area as others have pointed out. Otherwise, because of the warm ambient temperature, you will have the problem with latent heat of crystallization, and nothing would crystallize properly, and all your molded pieces would bloom. Also, even if you are holding properly crystallized chocolate in the 90-93F range, it will still continue to crystallize and thicken to a solid form (though still a very soft one) unless you are regularly doing something to break crystal down, like fluctuating the temperature to the upside occasionally.
I visited the Recchiuti operation in San Francisco two years ago, and he had made a "hot" room from a walk-in freezer by removing the cooling component and adding a heater. Basically, he kept it at somewhere in the upper 90 degree range and had large, painter size buckets of warm, liquid chocolate stored there. So whenever he needed warm chocolate, to say add to the enrober or other machines, he wouldn't have to wait for it to melt. He could just go in and grab a bucket of whatever type chocolate he needed. However, I don't believe he had the chocolate crystallized or "in temper" in old speak.
I work generally in a 62-67F environment and never have trouble with molding, with the exception of thick bars which have to be blown with a fan to remove the heat quickly.
Thanks! You're the first person to provide any kind of answer to this question.
Have passed this question around the world without an answer. As I understand, most if not all sea shipments of agricultural products such as rice, corn, and cacao must be fumigated (usally with methyl bromide) before shipping. I would like to know, under what circumstances (type of container used, or via air transport, etc.) are beans shipped and guaranteed not fumigated?-since any fumigated beans would no longer be "organic". It seems that fumigation is a very standard operating procedure performed not once, but sometimes 2x, on cocoa beans. So how do "organic" beans arrive stateside or to other cocoa processing countries?
I have also heard that some companies buy organic liquor in the country of origin, and have it shipped, since liquor does not require fumigation.
One questions that came to mind...if pure Nacional is extinct, and Dan Pearson says the USDA gene analysis found it is identical to pure Nacional and its "marker," where did they get the marker? What is the actual reference point here?
Nut pastes (gianduja, marzipan) are good but you have to watch out for fat migration which will soften your shells over time.
Butter based ganaches are good, for even less water content you might try using clarified butter (you can buy it off the shelf from many restaurant suppliers).
