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chocolate lover Guest
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Posted: Wed Mar 07, 2007 11:28 pm Post subject: thermometer |
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Does anyone know where to find a candy thermometer that measures below 100 degrees F? |
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Guest
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Posted: Mon Mar 19, 2007 8:59 pm Post subject: Where to buy candy thermometer |
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I found one at Walmart. They had lots of different ones. You can get digital for better accuracy. |
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GaryProtein
Joined: 26 Oct 2005 Posts: 535
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Posted: Mon Mar 19, 2007 11:33 pm Post subject: Re: wax |
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Anonymous wrote: | Bee's wax might work better if your worried about toxicity of perefin as bee's is completely inert. |
Bees wax will not give the same result as paraffin melts at about 133F and bees wax melts at about 147F. This is a very big difference when you mix it, even in very small amounts with chocolate.
Paraffin is an alkane, or mixture of linear alkanes with carbon chains over usually 20 carbons long. Paraffin is passed through the body completely unchanged/unmetabolized. Beeswax on the other hand is a mixture of compounds and there are occsasionally allergic skin reactionsto it. |
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Guest
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Posted: Tue Apr 24, 2007 3:56 am Post subject: mixing coveture and dipping wafers |
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Would it be worth it to try to mix small amounts of higher quality chocolate with dipping wafers;melting the wafers first the adding the other,like the seed method. Do you think it would make a higher quality result,while remaining inexpensive, or just ruin the nice chocolate? |
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Greg Guest
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Posted: Wed May 02, 2007 3:48 pm Post subject: Mixing coveture and dipping wafers |
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Remember that the wafers do not have the cocoa butter in them and that adding the chocolate would really not be seeding. You would need to work on a mix that had enough of the wafers to harden, or a mix that had enough of the chocolate, and properly tempered, to enjoy success. I've never used the wafers and would guess that you'd be better off using one or the other and not mixing; of course, there is something to be said for putting good chocolate into anything and there is certainly nothing wrong with experimenting--it's fun.
My indulgence: Chocolate Truffles |
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ladybug14 Guest
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Posted: Tue May 22, 2007 4:11 pm Post subject: Tempered Chocolate and Butter Cookies |
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Hi,
I tempered my chocolate correctly. I dipped butter cookies and they came out fine. I bagged them when they were dry. 4 days later....the chocolate started bubbling, looked like mold and started falling off the cookie. Does anyone know why this happened? I used Callebaut chocolate.
Any help would be appreciated.
Thank you! |
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Guest
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Posted: Wed May 30, 2007 9:10 pm Post subject: More about tempering from Wikipedia |
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I think this will be useful and wanted to share it....
Quote: | The fats in cocoa butter can crystallize in six different forms (polymorphous crystallization). The primary purpose of tempering is to assure that only the best form is present. The six different crystal forms have different properties.
Crystal Melting Temp. Notes
I 17 °C (63 °F) Soft, crumbly, melts too easily.
II 21 °C (70 °F) Soft, crumbly, melts too easily.
III 26 °C (78 °F) Firm, poor snap, melts too easily.
IV 28 °C (82 °F) Firm, good snap, melts too easily.
V 34 °C (94 °F) Glossy, firm, best snap, melts near body temperature (37 °C).
VI 36 °C (97 °F) Hard, takes weeks to form.
Making good chocolate is about forming the most of the type V crystals. This provides the best appearance and mouth feel and creates the most stable crystals so the texture and appearance will not degrade over time. To accomplish this, the temperature is carefully manipulated during the crystallization.
Generally, the chocolate is first heated to 45 °C (113 °F) to melt all six forms of crystals. Then the chocolate is cooled to about 27 °C (80 °F), which will allow crystal types IV and V to form (VI takes too long to form). At this temperature, the chocolate is agitated to create many small crystal "seeds" which will serve as nuclei to create small crystals in the chocolate. The chocolate is then heated to about 31 °C (88 °F) to eliminate any type IV crystals, leaving just the type V. After this point, any excessive heating of the chocolate will destroy the temper and this process will have to be repeated. However, there are other methods of chocolate tempering used-- the most common variant is introducing already tempered, solid "seed" chocolate. | From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chocolate#Tempering |
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Guest
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Posted: Wed May 30, 2007 9:17 pm Post subject: Question: |
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How long should I keep the chocolate at 88 degrees before it is tempered? After how long should I temporarily give up and let it cool and try again? |
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hrshl Guest
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Posted: Thu Oct 18, 2007 1:42 pm Post subject: chiocolate |
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well i have got a question.......that when we melt chocolate and water is added then it formed into curdled texture........ why is it so. |
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hrshl Guest
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Posted: Thu Oct 18, 2007 1:54 pm Post subject: Re: Tempered Chocolate and Butter Cookies |
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hi,
may be i have got that ans .
u have used DARK chocolate .
ok when u melt it and after that u rest it so bcoz of air contact it got set over u r cookies ..
now when u baged it u r bag should be airy enough so it doesnt get melt off.
but u may have used plastic bag so it wont be able to come in contact with air and dry out. but bcoz of warm air created inside the bag made a reason to get the chocolate melt off from the ur butter cookies |
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Guest
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Posted: Mon Oct 22, 2007 4:09 pm Post subject: about the paraffin. . . |
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Quote: | about the parafin comment... My aunt used to make chocolate covered peanut butter balls at Christmas... I used to love them until I learned she used parafin wax to keep the chocolate shiny. That ruined it for me... (boo hoo...) I just can't get past the thought of ingesting parafin anymore. Eating petroleum products seems to me a not-so-great idea. ; ) |
this is a little past overdue, but paraffin and vaseline are similar petroleum products. the inventor of vaseline lived to be 96 and he claimed he ate a tablespoon of it every day.
a good excuse to eat (lazily tempered) chocolate more often. . . if you need an excuse to eat chocolate, that is. |
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anoccasionalchocolate Guest
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Houston amateur Guest
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Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 4:19 pm Post subject: Making chocolate bowls |
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Hi, I saw Jacques Torres make the most amazing flower bowls made out of chocolate on PBS this weekend. I'm new at chocolate tempering and made a mess this weekend trying to recreate his masterpiece (he made it look SO easy!) He used balloons with dark tempered chocolate (dipped in the chocolate three times to make the flower effect). Stuck em in regrigerator for 8 minutes then popped the balloon and voila! Needless to say, I tried this many many times and had a host of problems. First, my chocolate didn't turn out dark, hard and shiny like his and second, my balloons kept sticking to the chocolate. Any advice on what best chocolate to use (i'm working on my tempering methods). It appears semi-sweet chocolate chips are NOT the best to use for tempering. I'm thinking dark bittersweet chocolate. Will it be sweet enough to eat the bowls? Is dark chocolate better for tempering? No matter how hard I tried to get the semi-sweet to turn liquid, essentially, it didn't work. It always stayed thick. The chocolate Jacque Torres used was very "watery." HELP!!!
Thanks! |
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Nika Taf Guest
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Posted: Wed Nov 14, 2007 10:59 am Post subject: |
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Hi All! I'm so glad I found this site. Can you recommend your favorite chocolate to work with? I am going to make chocolates for a craft fair... however, I would REALLY like to make PREMIUM chocolates rather than melting down chocolate chips. Any suggestions?
Thank You! |
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Guest
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Posted: Fri Nov 30, 2007 8:57 pm Post subject: in case you're curious.... |
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there's a new chocolate shop that opened in westcliffe, Co. it has some of the finest chocolates i've seen in ages, http://www.redneckchocolates.com/ i was satisfied with my purchase... |
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