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Old 26-04-2003, 02:21 PM
Gary Pollack
 
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Default SV: chocolate making -- Tempering Chocolate!

You seem to be heading for the subject of Tempering Chocolate, a high
calling for any botanist.

Well tempered chocolate has distinct characteristics:
Hard, snapping crisply when broken.
Feels dry to touch, smooth in the mouth.
If protected from heat it does not bloom (become whitish).
The chocolate melts at a specific temperature.
That temperature is one or two degrees below body temperature.
Mmmmmm.

The characteristics of chocolate defer to the dominant type(s) of
cocoa butter crystals. Temperature is the key:

at 115 F / 46.1 C all types melt.
at 95 F / 35 C the "most desireable" ones melt/solidify.
at 82 F / 27.8 C these desireable crystals begin to form.

According to my earlier reading, the working range for tempering
chocolate is:

93F / 33.9C down to 85F / 29.4C.

----------------------

Currently available online and paper references:

At epicurious.com the website associated with Bon Appetit and Gourmet
magazines there are fifty recipes currently online with instructions
for tempering chocolate imbedded. They are all the same (boilerplate
text), which reads as follows and credits a book, mentioned first, as
the source. (This was clipped from "Chocolate Leaves", which in the
picture were perhaps not botanatomically correct, at
http://www.foodtv.com/foodtv/recipe/...,20812,00.html):

"How to Temper Chocolate(From Dessert Circus, Extraordinary Desserts
You Can Make At Home by Jacques Torres):

"Chocolate is tempered so that after it has been melted, it retains
its gloss and hardens again without becoming chalky and white (that
happens when the molecules of fat separate and form on top of the
chocolate). There are a variety of ways to temper.

"One of the easiest ways to temper chocolate is to chop it into small
pieces and then place it in the microwave for 30 seconds at a time on
high power until most of the chocolate is melted. Be very careful not
to overheat it. (The temperature of dark chocolate should be between
88 and 90 degrees F, slightly warmer than your bottom lip. It will
retain its shape even when mostly melted. White and milk chocolates
melt at a temperature approximately 2 degrees F less because of the
amount of lactose they contain.) Any remaining lumps will melt in the
chocolate's residual heat. Use an immersion blender or whisk to break
up the lumps. Usually, chocolate begins to set, or crystallize, along
the side of the bowl. As it sets, mix those crystals into the melted
chocolate to temper it. A glass bowl retains heat well and keeps the
chocolate tempered longer.

"Another way to temper chocolate is called seeding. In this method,
add small pieces of unmelted chocolate to melted chocolate. The amount
of unmelted chocolate to be added depends on the temperature of the
melted chocolate, but is usually 1/4 of the total amount. It is
easiest to use an immersion blender for this, or a whisk.

"The classic way to temper chocolate is called tabliering. Two thirds
of the melted chocolate is poured onto a marble or another cold work
surface. The chocolate is spread out and worked with a spatula until
its temperature is approximately 81 degrees F. At this stage, it is
thick and begins to set. This tempered chocolate is then added to the
remaining non-tempered chocolate and mixed thoroughly until the mass
has a completely uniform temperature. If the temperature is still too
high, part of the chocolate is worked further on the cold surface
until the correct temperature is reached. This is a lot of work,
requires a lot of room, and makes a big mess.

"A simple method of checking tempering, is to apply a small quantity
of chocolate to a piece of paper or to the point of a knife. If the
chocolate has been correctly tempered, it will harden evenly and show
a good gloss within a few minutes."

On Sun, 22 Sep 2002 13:59:05 GMT, "Tron Furu"
wrote:


Archimedes Plutonium skrev i
...

So far the best I have come up with is to use spoons as the mold and to
make the chocolate melt sort of watery so that the thinness is achieved by
the degree of chocolate melt being watery and to dip the spoon with the
nut-paste quickly.


I don't know if I understood you correctly, but...

If you want dipping, try to make the nutpaste so thich as to stick to a thin
"needle" of wood (like a wood barbecue skewer). That gives you coating on
max. surface.

As to handling of chocolate for shaping, that is an art. There is more
"knack" than formula here; You'll probably get better tips in some
rec.food.something-group.
I seem to remember that for forming chocolate, you have to heat it to 38
degrees (? I think) Celsius, then cool it to about 27, then reheat to about
32, because this sequence does something to both viscosity and "stickiness".
The preferred working surface is a marble slab.

HTH

TF




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