Forum Activity for @Andy Ciordia

Are you talking about your ganache core or the shell?

I always enjoy when people say you can'trefrigerateor freeze your chocolate. Sure you can. It just takes care and recipe testing. We work in stages and all our cores are prepped ahead of time. Cores whether spherical or square are refigerated, we at times might freeze blocks of ganache if we're not ready to work through it yet. We focus on bulk enrobing runs, once readywe return to room temperature before the run.

Now at that point you have to think about chocolates contraction/expansion and freezing enrobed chocolates will more than likely crack in the flux. We treat our chocolates well and keep them at about 65'-68' from here on out.

So again, where is your grain, just the shell or in the core or in both? What kind of ganache are you making? A water, cream, syrup? Is it consistent across your infusions? What kind of infusion? Is it a pre-extracted infusion or an oil?

So much multivariate testing. :D Always be testing.

Most I've seen who do this, beneath the granite top is your fridge, same temp ranges as a normal chocolate case but built like a lowboy. So you have a few for show and the rest tucked away. Some have a top to the case and then you can get airflow and keep that part of your display cool as well. Then you don't need to transfer for night storage. Those like Frans who just have a plexi shield up are constantly restocking the little trays and I'm sure they put things up at night.

I haven't understood how you do volume sales like that. We have a rather standard built AA Fixtures case and when the season is hopping we are tearing through that case like chocolate fiends. If I had to duck down and pull out product my back would be broken.

We also run our shop rather cool, 67-69', the cold case is holding at 65' so really we can hold truffles in our kitchen for quite some time and end up doing so for a few days as we finish bulk runs.

It's really all in how you want to be perceived. I like the idea of having just a few of something out, it gives a little more focus and for some reason seems high end(?) but on an efficiency side I just can't see operationally how you rock through a peak sales period. Each of our trays in the case can get stacked I think 64+ units, easy and fast to draw from and multiple people can be in the case at the same time.

AA Fixtures will make that kind of case for you, I think Federal will too, but since it's not standard it's going to have some custom fee associated I'm sure.

There are no cheap guitar cutters. If they are too expensive, like we think they are, you can DIY one with a lot of elbow grease or do hacked solutions, like we do, with a caramel cutter and then a warm knife. It's not as chop-chop quick as a guitar but it doesn't cost much either.

Thanks Colin for all the information, a lot to ponder. I've read your other thread as well. Interesting thoughts... Since I had written the thoughts off for such a long time I'm not sure anymore of where to start, or when to start, but at least now I have enough information on ways to start. :D

Anyone hazard a guess at the time from start to finish?

I've looked a lot into panning, and found it to be really too much of a burden for us. Yet I continue to be asked for panned items. I've seen that silly attachment that is sold to make your Kitchen Aid a panner and have written it off time and time again as a joke.

After reading another person panning and I saw a K. Aid attachment mentioned, I thought I should stop thinking about it being a myth and see what you all thought.

1. Does it work?
2. What are the requirements?
3. What are the limitations?

Enrobers are beasts with attitudes, haha! If you can visit any others with a machine I'd definitely recommend it. We have a Perfect enrober as our introduction to them and it takes quite some time to setup, attention to detail to run, and then a breakdown cycle. Go into your purchase eyes wide open and all that. :D

Did you read Clay's shipping Primer? It's really a good one: http://www.thechocolatelife.com/forum/topics/summer-shipping-tips-tricks

I'm lost on how a well sealed, bubbled, mylar'd bag/box, and iced package didn't make it. We ship delicate white chocolate truffles across the country in 3 days during the summer and it still manages to get where it's going without ending up a mess.

If you ever have a real packing question talk to those who make the ice packs. Local to us is Providence Packaging ( www.providencepackaging.com ) if you talk to David Vance he can easily tell you what requirements you need to make any type of shipment. These guys are in the business of staying cool and have studies to boot. You can take it as far as dry icing to as simple as what Clay (and we) do.

This product just wasn't born with a nutty idea (grin.) I'd like to do some classic toffee's that use pecans or almonds, but with this product nuts would get in the way with the real simplicity of the concept.

Mark, would you hazard a guess at the percentage use for this application?

Ah thanks Kerry. We thought it might be as simple as that but web searches started confusing me. Someone called it a more refined canola oil. Clarified I can understand.

Still not quite sure a percentage to use when dealing with slabbing toffee but I'll go ahead and make some and see if Mark returns with thoughts.

Thanks Mark, that makes a lot of sense and after another half dozen trials I've really come to the conclusion that whatever tricks are working for people is location based. I can't repeatedly replicate anyones suggestion. What works great one time has near failure on second attempt. The most frustrating thing I have ever encountered.

Can you elaborate on Butter oil? We've never heard of it here so I don't have much of a reference. A brand, a rule of thumb perhaps?

Ruth, white just isn't chocolate haha. I mean it's cocoa butter with <1% solids. I expect it to behave differently. I could try some other chocolates but if I vary that's going to mess with the backbone of our operation or if I use the higher end that we use in our truffles it's liable to make my costs bend a bit out of proportion. I'll keep down this line a few more iterations before I'm done.

Anne, I score mine and to some degree that's helped as if it does break off oddly its just around the scored edges I've made. I have threatened that if I continue to fail at this that I'll end up scoring/cutting and then having the kitchen finish them on enrober days. I handle all of our costs based off a COG+L (cost of goods + labor & overhead) spreadsheet I've made and if I hand dipped each unit then broke it, the labor value exceeds percentages I like to keep on most of our products.

If only I could have made this like Robyn with a nut in it, then I could have handled this a few ways hehe. The fact that it's such a simple product (deceptively) creates more problems.

I've got a number of batches I have to crank out this week. Once I take into account some of the addendum's made with Tims observations I'd like a few more cracks at it before I throw in the towel. In the end this can be a large multivariate problem and it only takes a few variables I feel to create issues. Here I thought 6 months ago I was doing something that'd be easy. Haha!

Tim, yea I have a few more thoughts to work through. I employed multiple new ideas in one go and that's never a great idea. You should only change one thing per round so you can keep better control.

Robyn, your first method works fine with me. But since we have a naked product. All I use is sea salt, I can't cover the streaking bloom that happens from an untempered product. If I use nuts then my nut allergy crowd would go nuts, hehe!That lead me to wanting to have a tempered solution. I'm amazed you've never had a separation problem with tempered chocolate. You've got a low porosity buttered surface with a slathering of a tempered chocolate which by nature releases.

Searching online nearly everyone who uses tempered chocolate has a chocolate/toffee separation issue that drives them back to an untempered idea.

It could also be the chocolate that's being used. White chocolate doesn't give me this problem at all. Tempered or not.

It's a strange and fickle beast. If anyone does not have this problem, feel very very lucky that your environment, recipe, and/or product choices have coincided to not create a problem. :D

ahaha. Christopher, small batches take you places. We have a tasters circle we bring in to vet our ideas. Make a few small batches, get an idea of the process and potential workload, if you like it, if more importantly customers like it, then bam-zoom. You're in trouble for creating a sensation. hehe.

Latest update on this test batch.. I had to use a knife to cut along my score lines, I was seeing more sharding than I would have liked but when cutting it I only saw a small amount of toffee/chocolate separation.

I have to try this again though. Because I was basically cooking my toffee longer in the oven I had a higher % of butter separation than I am used to. This could be creating an issue with the test if even after a good and through wiping the excess I feel it could be throwing a bit of this off. I also want to try not scoring it. Scoring can pool butter which may increase the sharding.

So positive signs but inconclusive. More experimentation!

Ok. We have a convection oven and I left it on. Maybe not the best idea. It's amazing I can tell there is a difference in the sugar setting up. Look forward to seeing how it rests over the next day.

I spread about a tsp, maybe a little more with a brush over the cooled toffee (wiped any excess butter) until the water got a little tacky then immediately ladled on our tempered chocolate.

I let it set up about an hour and just got finished fiddling with about half of it. I'm still seeing quite a bit of sharding. Underneath the tempered chocolate it's a little soft still. How long do you let your slab rest before you break into it?

If I switch from breaking it to knifing it, cutting into it, that's working pretty well.

I'm walking away from it for the night. See if that moist-ish layer between the toffee and chocolate dries/soldifies/whatever and will try again in the morning. If you have any further input on that stage, awesome.

Hey Tim, I've tried part one of your suggestions--I let it sit in a 150'c / 302'f oven and it spread a little. I had to jiggle it to the corners to help move it around. How long do you use the oven for? I started w/ 5m.

Is yours convection or standard? Few finer points I had not thought through.

It seemed to work well enough though. Looking forward to trying the couple tsps of water brushed on then tempered chocolate. Oooh experimentation!

Ah you can reach me at andy at thesecretchocolatier dot com if you have anything offsite you want to discuss, or PM me here if you need.

It looks like our recipes are very similar, I think our only difference might be cream instead of milk. Thinking back over my purchase lists.

As you may have noticed our batch sizes are not incredible. We usually keep things much smaller so we keep a good control over it all and it all stays fresh. Most all of our truffles and caramels are done in < 200 unit batches.

I've never heard of using corn syrup solids. My father-in-law controls all the caramels so I'll ask him next time I see him.

Trying to visualize how large a pot you all are using. We use induction cooktops here to keep more heat out of the kitchen but you're creeping into the zone where you're going to need more output than those magnetic beasts allow for. I can't quite recall how large out pot is.. I think I'm using a 5Qt SS but I may be off.

We did a laser thermometer check of hot pans out of the oven. Within the first minute they've lost half their heat. Amazing how quick that happens. Inversely a cold pan absorbs half the toffee heat in about the same time. Using smaller pans (1/2 sheets) is smart, they can't be used as heat sinks so much due to the limited size.

Love the discussion, lots of interesting thoughts and perspectives on how we accomplish the task. Anne you're usage early on in this discussion of Toffee Hell has gotten a consistent laugh by my family.

Silpat works but I found parchment paper worked just as well. The toffee might start pulling threads off the edge of the silpats so just be aware. That eventually annoyed me enough that I went back to parchment paper. The rolling pin is an interesting thought. I used one early on during the setup phase and it didn't help as much as an offset spatula and being fast as one could be.

You've given me a lot to think about today Tim. Thank you for signing up and participating. I really appreciate it.

Wow Tim, you're doing great between the proverbial rock and a hard place.

I was wondering if the chocolate sieze was preventing water absorption. Looking forward to my next batch to give that idea shot.

You're 2x what I'm up to; how do you manage to spread that much material in the time it takes for the toffee to start setting? We were heating pans but that just takes too much time/heat/effort, but to spread one whole sheet pan you get one or two spreads attempts then--well you better like what you've done haaha!

Nice looking product Tim. What is that about a 1/4"?

Are you brushing both sides with water before coating?

It's odd to think that we don't want toffee/sugar products absorbing water out of the air, but a little applied doesn't expedite a softening of the product.

I'm curious what batch sizes you all are working in? I started at 1#, then to 3# now I'm at the max I can do by hand which is about 5.5# (two sheet pans.) I'm definitely eyeing a fire kettle for the future as I think my rotator cuff might just drop off if I do this too long hehe!

Do you all score it as well before hand? I have a pizza wheel I'll do some 4"x2" (relative) squares to aid in snapping/breaking later. I feel like that would put it at a disadvantage if I wanted to dual coat it.

If Tim is talking Celcius it's be about 76'F which is still rather warm for my liking it's more what I was considering his temp.

Double side coating is always something we've thought of but I've never liked the result. Maybe if you have a thick toffee then two sides is good, if you have a near paper thin toffee (ours is about 1/8th of an inch) then the toffee itself will get lost with that much chocolate. However you are right your shelf life will be extended due to the oxygen barrier that a full enrobing would do. I think we get about a month or so while exposed.

Then of course you have costs to juggle depending on where/who you are sourcing from.So many variables..

Wow Tim. That is so counterintuitive I have to try it. Thanks for your input and story. :D

Welcome Anne and thanks for your own insights. I never thought I could be frustrated by one thing so much. I'm nearing the point where if I want to do it with utmost consistency I need it scored, broken/cut and then just toss it on our enrober when we do those production runs.

If I ever find something that works time and time again I'll definitely share it.

Arthur, I kind of describe the steps in the beginning of this thread. The main two ways I deal with post-toffee creation is to either let it come down to room temp on speed racks or after scoring I'll chill it, then let return it to a rack to regain room temp.

It really depends on how fast we need the material ready that day. I've never just chilled and enrobed it, that seems counterintuitive.

Ok, I've made about 20# since I wrote this and trialled out quite a few variants mentioned by Ruth. I found a little cocoa powder is helpful--enough to soak up whatever butter/oil wasn't able to be easily wiped off. However, too much increases sharding, so much so I was nearly infuriated with a batch. I ended up stripping it and redoing it as wafers.

Next I found probably the best method outside hand dipping and that was to ladle on your chocolate, add your inclusion, and right before its fully set, break it then. The layer touching the toffee is still unset, so it pulls a bit gooey but it will not separate at this stage.

I have mixed feeling about this method. It works, sure that's good. But it means I can't just batch process a lot and break later. It also means you can use tempered chocolate pretty safely.

Still holding out for a magic method.

Oh Ruth don't tell me that.. LoL! I was betting with my wife that anyone who used chopped/ground nuts were covering bloom.

I agree totally on your observation. This isn't a marriage made in heaven, a minutely slippery surface with a material that likes to shrink when cold, release well when tempered, and isn't thatporous.

Right now I love a 60% chocolate sea salt but it's a rather naked product so you see a bloom happen. Someone said they liked how it looked, like we did it on purpose. Heh, that gave me a giggle.

I do a white chocolate honey toffee and I have a consistent <= 1% shearing of the white chocolate but since we know its composition is so much more--buttery and the honey is just a little more tacky I can't use it in comparison.

I've been real watchful of toffees since trying to solve this, there's got to be a knack for getting some greater consistency. I have 9# of toffee to make by the weekend so I'll attempt the cocoa idea and see if anyone else has some thoughts.

For the past 3 months I've explored, enjoyed and been successful with a butter toffee. Where Iconsistentlyhave issues is the chocolate layer shearing from the toffee during the breaking up of toffee stage.

Let's explore what's been done..

• I began like many do and let the chocolate melt on the surface of the hot toffee. This worked somewhat well but had some unpredictable outcomes. It would shear from 5% to 30% depending on batch and regardless the chocolate would bloom within the week.
• I then went to the toffee cooling method; I would pour the toffee, score it multiple times, cool it, come back to it later, wipe off any excess butter sheen (and it's been pretty minimal) then use a microwave to prepare the chocolate. This seemed to bring down my shearing to 0% to 15%. However much of the time the chocolate would bloom again within the week.
• Lastly I've gone to preparing it, scoring, cooling, wiping and then using tempered chocolate to coat the top and I get a 15% to 35% shearing.

I'm good at troubleshooting, I've got an engineering background so walking through steps andanalyzingthe situation runs in my blood but this.. this is head to wall bashing frustrating.

If you make toffee professionally what step am I missing? I have my toffee down to a rhythm, no separation, beautiful quality, flavor, color--but this lack of chocolateadhesiondrives me nuts. I'm about to just start scoring and breaking then enrobing squares but that makes the time of prep go up which I'd rather not do on most of the line I'm working on.

I feel there is a tip or trick I've not been privy to--that eludes me--driving me up a wall heheh!

Chocolate is very nuanced. Welcome to the learning curve. :D

You mention you are getting bloom, but is this bloom happening after the condensation? That could be the problem in general. Condensation will aid in pulling the sugars out and when they dry you'll easily have sugar bloom.

AFAIK, I've never seen cold effect bloom. It can create cracking as chocolate shrinks as it cools. Humidity and your tempering methods are more a possibility.

In general your tempering methods need to be exacting. Tempering is usually a raising of temperature, a lowering of temperature, then a raising of temperature (not too much--dependent on kind) again. Extended tempers can even repeat the reduce and raise.

Was your blooming happening before you added agents to it? Did the same occur when you were doing the seed chocolate? You mention these tempering aid's (not familiar) but what is your main chocolate you are using. Is the whole thing a semi-sweet? Probably some of the easiest chocolate to work with is in this range.

Lots of fantastic resources and books out there.. You can find many recommendations for PierreWybauw, the CIA's book Chocolate Confections, or even some more soft books like Making Artisan Chocolates or Chocolate Obsession might help.

Keep a log, record whatvariablesyou can, and keep up the trials. It's not easy but once you find the rhythm and reason you'll forget a lot of the early setbacks. :D

Cool Antonino. It looks like you went for bracketing instead of welding it. A few other deviations from the plans you posted. Any further modified notes on how you made yours? It looks a bit easier to construct.

I have a SS fabricator friend in FL I was thinking of approaching with the concept as well. It'd be neat to see someone in America producing these that doesn't cost so much. It's not rocket science.

For now though I just want a hacked solution to get the job done.

Yea I looked at that again recently as a thought. I don't really want a push through though. Either a top down push (whether on a rail or free-form) or hinged idea.

Push throughs could work good for straight ganache but if you do any nuts* or soft-caramels (*caveats abound but they can be done with standard guitars) it would cause too much tearing with this system.

Great thread, thanks for the info Antonino!

Excellent! I am great with chewing gum, paperclips, and wire cutters.

If you can find your details that'd be great, much appreciated.

Anyone built their own Guitar? I really don't want to expend resources on one right now and my brain just can't come up with the justification for the cost association, always seems like highway robbery. We're starting to move out of hand rolled though and cutting with a knife is tedious.

In my head I've got PVC pipes in a square with stainless strings tightened by eyelets or thumbscrews spaced however seen fit with a hinge.

So--built your own? Come across some plans for a DIY project? If I could spend a few hours and < a couple hundred I'd feel it was a worthy small project.

You know come to think of it I've never seen our transfer sheets fade. There must be something out there that has a more reliable or longer color hold that isn't toxic.

"In these black bags we have 2 colored pretzel sticks.", heheh!

We've noticed colors can fade in the dark as well, might be an oxidization thought to it. Mainly it is our blues that go--sometimes red but it's not consistent. Same things happen with some of our icing colors with cakes.

Love to know a trick or brand that has more resilience. We want to try the food-based-colors as well. Neat to see if beets do the same.

Pricing is always derived from your COGS or COGS+L(abor) numbers. It's hard to arbitrarily price something as you're requirements and overhead are different from my own. You also want to be above your margin threshold, for some it's 300% for some foodservice they are lucky to get 80% so YMMV.

Just noticed Antonino's post and he's right on.

Oh we could have a long tirade of over used notions.. Dark chocolate? Abused percentages? Starbucks trying to own the word macchiatoand then redefining it as something that it's not.. The incorrect usage of Gourmet.. Whitewashing, Greenwashing, Pinkwashing..

As a marketer I'm jaded--for a fun (hehe) read check out Brandwashing.