Forum Activity for @Clay

Lovey Dovey?

Posted in: Opinion

Lowe:

It's simple ... you have to become a "Dove At Home" chocolatier, buy their equipment and chocolate and start a small chocolate business (a bit like Pampered Chef) so you can join THEchocosphere.com, contribute to the community and get points for contributing.

I wonder if that would work on TheChocolateLife. 1 point for uploading a photo, 1 point for a comment, 2 points for starting a discussion or blog ...

I don't think it would make TheChocolateLife any better (and it might diminish the value as people would post to rack up points, not because they had anything useful to contribute).

:: Clay

Lovey Dovey?

Posted in: Opinion

Casey,

As always, thanks for the laugh with your inimitable style! I didn't even catch the humor or your title until I clicked on the link. Unfortunately, I don't think that poor Ashley knew what might happen if you become inimical to her though.

Gotta love Dove. I liked this:

GREAT INCOME OPPORTUNITY:... Sponsor and mentor a team and the possibilities are endless.

Plus there are "Success stories". Nice MLM!

Lovey Dovey?

Posted in: Opinion

I wish I was cool enough to be invited. sniffle, sniffle.

And you could get rich too! I found this on the User agreement

Participants will receive one (1) five dollar ($5.00) Amazon.com E-mail gift card for every two hundred (200) points earned.

• Points are earned by completing tasks in the community. The point value for completing each community event will be clearly stated in the event description.
• A participant may not receive more than $595.00 worth of rewards, or any other items of value from Think Passenger, Inc. during any calendar year.

Wow! If you earned a mere 23,800 points you could make $595!! (Now how do you earn points?)

Lovey Dovey?

Posted in: Opinion

You must be invited and be given a username and password to log on to the site. You can't just sign up, like you can here at TheChocolateLife.Apart from everything else - does anyone see a problem with usurping the name of chocosphere.com (which BTW is a registered trademark)?TheChocosphere.com is operated as a "private on-line community" by a third-party - a company called Think Passenger. Interestingly, Mars is not listed as one of Think Passenger's customers. If you want to be totally disgusted, read the "Rules of Participation" and Privacy Policy (they own all the content contributed, among other things, and you have to provide a valid mailing address and agree to receive mailings ... "We only collect your Personal Information for the purposes of managing and monitoring your account and passing such Personal Information to the relevant Passenger Client on whose behalf we have collected it. ")When will they learn that it's just chocolate?:: Clay

Lovey Dovey?

Posted in: Opinion

   I get letters, and some of them just have to be passed along to my fellow chocolate 
   passionistas. 


  Hi Casey, 

   I am a huge fan of your blog and I wanted to reach out to you to tell you about this
 really     cool new chocolate community. This community works within a leading
 chocolate company,     currently developing some really innovative new concepts around
 chocolate. The aim is to     open a dialogue with chocolate enthusiasts, and then let
 those enthusiasts (like YOU!) help     shape and influence new product development,
 provide feedback and interact with other     chocolate lovers.    I think you would be an
 awesome contributor to The ChocoSphere-- I love your chocolate     reviews! Your ideas
 and voice would help influence new product development for a top     chocolate brand.
 You can share your thoughts and feedback, and have an impact on this     brand's
 future!
     I'd love to send you a personalized link to join the community-please email me
 confirming     your interest and I'll send one over. Or, if you have any questions, please
 let me know.
     Sincerely, 
   Ashley 

   The ChocoSphere
  
   www.thechocosphere.com 

    /~A private community for chocolate passionistas~///
   

 


  So I received this email from one of my super fans, who shall remain last
 nameless, i  t seems. Out of curiosity I wanted to inquire as to what business it
 was that would ask of   my chocolate consultancy free of charge, and just
 generally whose chocolate I would imbibe.   After all, my mom always taught me
 never to accept candy from strangers. Ashley was so friendly, and she sure
 knows how to flatter a person, flattered the pants right off.

 So my pants on the ground, and my curiosity thus piqued, and knowing that
 Ashley did say she would be happy to answer any questions I might have, I sent
 her just one simple question before I was ready to sign my life away.

 But her reply was   also a rebuff, and quickly revealed that poor Ashley was
 suffering from amnesia all about our   new BFF status, and about who, in fact,
 I even was. 




  Hi Casey,  

  Unfortunately I can't tell you the name of the company, but it is a leading
  chocolate brand and we'd love to invite you into the community!  Please confirm your
  occupation and I can send you over a link to join the community. 

  Sincerely,  Ashley 
  The ChocoSphere
    www.thechocosphere.com  
   ~A private community for chocolate passionistas~ 
 

  Now we do know something about Ashley, even though we may not know
 her last name, or   the name of her company. But other than that she is a great
 flatterer and very passionate, we may only know this: She will vary the amount
 of tildes and slashes   bordering the chocolate passionista slogan, depending on
 her mood and/or degree of amnesia.
 
  Now the only other place I've really seen the phrase "chocolate passionistas"
 about the web was    here , in this "community for chocolate passionistas,"
 brought to you by Dove Chocolate. Won't some kind soul direct Ashley there, so
 that she can recover some of her memory?
  

updated by @Casey: 04/12/15 03:49:04

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

I have no reason to believe it's the best in the world either, I certainly make no claims to such extent, and I'm the one making the chocolate! Taste is subjective, and no single individual should have the right to pass judgement on anyone's creations but their own.

All I can do is proudly pass on what one of the most respected chocolatiers in the world has told me (and put in writing). His tastes are subjective too. However, as Barry Callebaut's Technical Director,at the very least he's one person who is certainly qualified to provide an opinion, and lend credibility to what I do - credibility which has been questioned many times on this forum.

Brad.

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

If Brad's chocolate were the best in the world, I wouldn't mind making a trip to Calgary (en route to stunning Banff National Park) to stock up on bars. But, not having tasted it, until I hear credible voices proclaiming it such, I have no reason to believe it's the best in the world. I'll have to remain agnostic until circumstances take me (or a willing chocolate mule) to Calgary or until Brad teams up with a US importer/distributor.

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

Clay,

Thanks for your response. If you posted this from the East Coast then it was about 2:30a.m. when you posted. That speaks to me of your concern about this issue.

As I see it, you both make some valid points. The bottom line is that respect is paramount and you've shown respect and restraint in your posts. I appreciate the humility of your apology.

I think that, along with every member here, you and Brad both benefit from this community, and you both add value to it (unless there is contention and a lack of respect). To add this value with your contributions takes your time, energy, and often research. Clay, you of course contribute more to this community than anyone, but you also probably directly benefit more from it than anyone. I think that you both need to think of the rewards you get from this community (both direct and indirect).

Brad should certainly gain more customers from his OP.

After the claims that Brad made about the quality of his chocolate it's a shame that it isn't more widely available, but I can understand the rationale that he explained why he's not set up to ship. I'm glad that I never emailed him to inquire about getting some of his chocolate, though.

Now I think I'll just contemplate and imagine eating a Chuao or Porcelana bar...

Peace,

Lowe

ChocoFiles

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

To all participants in this conversation and members of TheChocolateLife:

Rarely do I get as much private mail about a discussion as I have about this one. It's pretty evenly split, but there are several members who believe that I have overstepped my bounds in responding as I have to Brad. So, to all of you who feel that way now or who may come to feel this way after reading what I have to say - and to Brad - I apologize. Brad has been a long-time contributor to the community and his comments are appreciated by many. Including me: though there are times I wish he would choose to express himself differently.

I would like to add, not by way of excuse (there is none), but of explication, an analogy I believe I have offered to Brad privately: If I walked into Brad's store in Calgary and started talking in a loud voice using language he thought was disrespectful of other customers it would be within his right to walk over to me and ask me to quiet down and to refrain from using the language he found disrespectful. My "shop" (TheChocolateLife.com) is open to anyone, anywhere in the world, who is willing to spend a few moments signing up to join - free of any charge or obligation. Most of the people who visit my shop do so quietly, anonymously, reading, learning, but not contributing (or buying anything). There is no compulsion on my part to contribute in any way.Those who wish to contribute do so.What I ask, however, is that when visitors to my shop do contribute they do so in a reasonable tone of voice using respectful language.

If I was being disrespectful to Brad (and by extension to every member of TheChocolateLife), again I apologize to those who took offense and contacted me. I have invested a lot of time, effort, and love in creating and nurturing TheChocolateLife community over the past three years to the point where it now counts nearly 4000 members in over 100 countries. One of the things that has contributed to this growth, I think, is the work I have done publicly (leading by example) and privately (when I felt necessary) to maintain a certain level of civil discourse.

We may not all like white chocolate, but we all like chocolate ... and that provides a common ground for gathering together to share what we know. Collectively, we know a great deal more than individually. That is the reason I started TheChocolateLife in the first place; to create a place where people (including me) could come to get their questions answered. Though we may disagree at times, we are all united by our fascination and passion for this thing called chocolate.

Thanks for your support, consideration, and patience:
:: Clay
Creator/Moderator

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

Clay;

Thanks for the reply. I'm not interested in debating anything with you either.

You're right about my comment referring to the "dufus". Sorry about that. I called him a dufus, because he sent me a scathing email when I politely said I wouldn't.

My posts here are strictly charitable and based upon my experience in the industry and in business in general. I gain nothing from my contributions, other than the satisfaction of giving back to the business/chocolate community and helping others out there who are having the same challenges with chocolate that I did when I first started.

Given that fact, and the fact that people HAVE benefitted from my posts, and you as the owner of this site have benefitted from my membership and posts (I help to enrich the content of YOUR site on my dime), why would you even fathom the idea that I would pay anything - whether it be money OR chocolate to enrich your business without getting anything tangible in return???

Wow....

You certainly do have a set of balls Clay! I'll give you that.

Brad

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

Brad:

I don't want to get into an argument with you about the way you choose to run your business. You're free to do whatever you want - it's your business. And I completely respect your growth/cashflow argument.

What I do want to mention is that the person who was interested in buying a bar of chocolate from the UK is NOT a "dufus" as you referred to him. This is a person who had heard about your chocolate and was interested in trying it so inquired if there was a way to get any. The fact that his inquiry did not fit your business model does not make him stupid and there is absolutely no need to denigrate him - nor anyone - by using such dismissive language.

I know you have very strong opinions on many things, including sampling, PR, and more. I would love to be able to drive business your way ... lots of people do visit Calgary, some of them have to like chocolate, and some of them may read TheChocolateLife, subscribe to one of my Twitter feeds, find me on Facebook ... or learn about your business from me in one way or another.

I can only conclude that you don't care whether I taste it or not, what I think. You have more than enough market in the Calgary area to keep you busy. Good for you. However, take a look at it from my perspective for a second ... there is a community here that I have nurtured for three years. You have been an active (and mostly welcomed) member of the community for more than eighteen months, and I have received comments from members supporting you in response to my post. I don't charge you a penny for being a member and I have to assume that you get some value and satisfaction from being a member here.

Isn't that worth a bar (or three) of chocolate? Without requiring me to spend a couple of thousand bucks?

:: Clay

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

Interesting reply Clay.

You spend a lot of time wondering why I don't ship or deliver. The answer is VERY simple. I DON'T NEED TO. There's a million people in this city, another 600,000 in the immediate surrounding area.The business is growing exponentially with the customer base I have direct access to. It makes absolutely NO business sense whatsoever, to incur the cost of researching packaging options, researching shipping options, applying for the shipping accounts, purchasing packaging and labeling, and then setting up infrastructure in our shop to handle shipping, just to send a chocolate bar to the UK (and YES, some dufus wanted me to ship ONE chocolate bar to him in the UK! WTF????).

Why Derrick and Mark chose to fly to Calgary, and chose to spend an evening with me only they can answer. The fact is they DID. You seem to be buddy buddy with everyone in the chocolate industry. Why don't you call them up and ask them yourself, instead of hypothesizing their motives publicly via the rational that they flew here to buy a chocolate bar.

Your reply is a great example of why small businesses STAY small. They spread themselves too thin trying to cashflow unneccessary growth. Only when a business has completely tapped their existing market, or if they have excess resources to explore others, should they burden themselves with consumers outside of their immediate market reach.

As an FYI, in the next couple of days I WILL be offering delivery service, but only to the Calgary area. It's a convenience our existing customers have been asking for, and I've developed a relationship with a local courier company that will allow our software to interact with theirs, without any human intervention.

Hope this answers your question.

Cheers.

Brad

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

Brad's approach to marketing his product has always been interesting to me ... he requires people to physically go to his shop in Calgary to get product: he does not ship anything to anyone (including me, as I have mentioned). This makes it incredibly difficult for those of us in the chocolate community who care about such things to get our hands on his products to taste them for ourselves and form our own opinions - and communicate those opinions to the rest of the world.

Intrigued by the opinions of two BC reps who visited, I had to ask myself, even if what Brad makes is some of the best chocolate in the world ... is it worth the cost? Not the price - the cost. I can walk into a local store in NYC and buy a 2oz bar of the 2002 Valrhona Chuao for $35. That's about $250/lb. A lot, I know, but $35 is something I can easily afford for special occasions.

The least expensive r/t flights I can find from NYC to Calgary cost US$552 with a route time totaling over 20 hours. I can get a non-stop for over $832 that takes about half the time. When I factor in the time it takes to get to the airport, overnighting (at least) in Calgary, incidental expenses (airport transfers, accommodations, meals), one of Brad's bars of chocolate costs me, what? At least $800 but only if I don't factor into the equation the value of my time (after all, I am a chocolate professional, and I do need to factor the value of my time into this whole process as I am not likely to choose Calgary as a vacation destination). That brings the cost (time and expenses) of a bar of Brad's chocolate to be between $1500 and $2500.

I don't know about you, but even if it is the best chocolate in the world, it's not worth the cost (the price of a bar is only $12) - to me - to go find out if it's as good as some people say it is.

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

'Tis a pity. I'm always up for reviewing a new b2b company, especially one that received such high accolades. I'm on a quest to taste, review, and compare every Chuao and Porcelana bar made, but I guess this will have to wait indefinitely. Oh well...

Lowe

ChocoFiles

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

Lowe:

The ONLY way to get chocolate (bars or confections) from Brad is to visit him in Calgary. I've asked him on numerous occasions in the past and he has categorically refused on this point.

:: Clay

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

Brad,

Are your Choklat Chuao and Porcelana bars available anywhere in the U.S.? If not, do you ship to the U.S.? I'm interested in these bars, so I'd like to know how I can get them.

Feel free to PM me too. I can give you my email address if you need to send me any shipping information.

Thanks,

Lowe

ChocoFiles

P.S.- If I can make a friendly suggestion-- on your TCL page you should put the name of your company and a link to how to learn more. It's not readily apparent, at least that I could see, so it took me a little bit of detective work to track down the information.

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

Interesting indeed. I'm a displaced Torontonian now living in Belgium, and word hadn't gotten to me that we now had 2 chocolate-makers in Canada. My dad will be in Calgary soon enough though (he helps organize the Stampede,) so I think I'll be asking him to ship me a few of your bars

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

You should be proud Brad! And....all the people who argue or complain are just jealous or showing off by trying to "one up" you. So happy you are back on here... maybe I'll check in more frequently now. You are a good guy... everyone should appreciate your advice. ~Wendy

Interesting Visitors....

Posted in: Opinion

Hi Everyone.

For the past couple of years I have beenmaking various contributions to this forum. Some have had me take some heat. Some of the responses to my posts have been downright insulting to me. Others have asked some very pointed questions - questions such as "Who are you to be saying what you do?"

It's a valid question, seeing as I don't present people outside of Calgary with the opportunityto buy my chocolate and confections, and this is a global forum.

Having said that, I feel it's appropriate to, this once, blow my own horn, and provide some legitimacy to what it is that I do here in Calgary.

Here'sa true story:

On January 20th, I happened to be in my shop doing some last minute running around before going to the mountains for the weekend.

A couple of relatively unassuming gentlemen entered the shop and began talking to Charmaine, my head chocolatierat length. As I walked past, Charmaine handed me one of their cards. To my suprise, they were from Chocolate Giant Barry Callebaut. Not only that, but they were none other than Derrick Tu Tan Pho, Barry Callebaut's Technical Director, and Mark Pennington, Western Canada's Sales Manager!

They said they'd heard great things about my little shop, and had flown to Calgary tosee what I was I doing!

Holy Cow!

We talked at length, and I invited them to an event I was hosting this evening. They graciously accepted and spent the evening with 10 patrons, listening to me blabber on about chocolate, and what we do in our shop, and what makes our chocolate so much better than mainstream mass produced chocolate.

By the end of the evening, they were blown away with Choklat. Derrick paid me one of the biggest compliments I've had yet in my career as a chocolatier. He said that my chocolate is every bit as good as the finest chocolate in the world - chocolate made by artists like Cluizel, Amedei, and Valhrona!

He also provided some great tips with regard to our confections, and how to increase shelf life without compromising quality.

In a follow up email, Mark was quoted as typing:

"Sensational chocolate class tonight. I also really enjoyed your products.
In fact a Remarkable effort and some of the best bean to bars chocolate I've seen."

So, for those of you out there on the "chocolate net", who question who I am, or what I do, or the quality of that which I make,the fact that one of the most respected chocolatiers in the world makes a trip to little 'ol Calgary to visit ME, and then pays such high praise to my creations, I hope this nullifies any doubts you may have with regard to my skill with cocoa beans.

Cheers everyone, and Happy Chocolate Making.

updated by @Brad Churchill: 04/10/15 15:35:46

Truffle trees

Posted in: Chocolate Education

I was going to suggest a cardboard cone, which can be found at many different craft places, but that looks real cool Stu.

If you choose to use the cone method, you can wrap your truffles in colorful foil (I'm a redneck and like shiny things), and then use "sticky dots" to fix them to the cone.

Another idea is to check out the website at www.sunflowersugarartusa.com They have edible glitter that we use in our shop for "blinged out" lollipops. You could roll your truffles in glitter too for your tree.

...but I DO like the one in the photo that was just posted. Probably the nicest I've seen yet.

Cheers,

Brad

Truffle trees

Posted in: Chocolate Education

Hi

Here is an example of the old "cone ball and toothpick" - this is from House of Chocolate in New Zealand.

Truffle trees

Posted in: Chocolate Education

Hi! I am looking to make chocolate truffle trees/towers for weddings and other events. Does anyone know if there are tools to do this, or just simple a foam cone and toothpicks? I am looking for something sturdier and specific to this purpose.

updated by @Krista: 05/21/15 18:31:30

Are Chocolates Best Gift Choice for This Valentine........

Posted in: News & New Product Press (Read-Only)

Are Chocolates Best Gift Choice for This Valentine......................
updated by @La Chocolat: 12/13/24 12:16:07

Natural Chocolate sauce original recipe with decent shelf life ????

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

I (as well as others) focused on your question about Lecithin...but you also asked about cocoa liquor. I was wondering if you knew what 'cocoa liquor' was?

Cocoa liquor is simply ground cocoa mass, generally at the stage prior to pressing to separate the cocoa powder and the cocoa butter. Sometimes this is called unsweetened chocolate, although unsweetened chocolate might also refer to the same stuff after it has been further refined to reduce particle size.

In any case, if you want a decent shelf life in a sauce, you are going to need to control water activity. Since you likely want to keep the water content high in order to get the right texture for a sauce, you need ingredients that will 'bind' this water yet keep things fluid...and these 'humectants' are commonly the compounds that you say you don't want to use.

I'd suggest looking more closely at the whole range of humectants, learn and understand their properties, and then look for acceptable humectants that share these properties. You already know that honey is very similar to inverted sugar; honey is arguably a better humectant than inverted sucrose, more like the dreaded high fructose corn syrup So perhaps a naturally sourced honey is acceptable where a chemically similar HFCS or inverted sugar is not.

Sorbitol is found in many fruits; perhaps a fruit concentrate is acceptable.

Finally, plain ordinary sugar will lower water activity.

Good luck!

Jon

Natural Chocolate sauce original recipe with decent shelf life ????

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

Interesting thought. Since it apparently occurs in every living cell you would imagine cacao pods should contain some for example.

Personally the extraction of lecithin by hexane is enough to put me off.

Natural Chocolate sauce original recipe with decent shelf life ????

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

I know that most lecithin is manufactured from soy, but that it is found all over the place. I recall seeing a reference to palm lecithin.

What I am wondering: does anyone make _cocoa_ lecithin. You could have your lubrication and keep it pure cocoa mass

-Jon

Natural Chocolate sauce original recipe with decent shelf life ????

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

I forgot to mention in my earlier post that lecithin can also thicken chocolate too, if used in large enough quantities. I've been told that the magic number is about 0.5% by weight, but it's taken me as much as 0.8% to get my chocolate to thicken in my tests.

Natural Chocolate sauce original recipe with decent shelf life ????

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

Actually, in reference to lecithin being an emuslifier in chocolate, you are incorrect, and if Wikipedia says so, it's incorrect too.

Chocolate is essentially tiny pieces of cocoa solids (beans or powder), sugar, and vanilla bean all suspended in a fat (cocoa butter). The fat behaves in a very specific way - crystalizing in various forms at various temperatures. When it crystalizes, it suspends the solid particles in amongst the crystals.

An emulsifier is essentially a compound which "glues" two opposing compounds with similar properties, such as is the case with Mayonnaise, where oil and water are emulsified to form that condiment.

Cocoa solids, and cocoa butter do not have similar properties. One is always solid, and the other one is a crystalized liquid.

In the manufacturing of chocolate, lecithin is used as a lubricant, to make the chocolate more fluid. This is the case in most milk chocolates, where a significant portion of the fluid fat (cocoa butter) is reduced due to the increase of solid suspended fat in the powdered cream used. In some cases, manufacturers will use powdered skim milk and anhydrous milk fat instead of powdered cream. Either way, the reduction in crystalizing fat warrants lecithin.

In the case of high percentage dark chocolate, lecithin is also used to increase fluidity. Cocoa butter is considered the most expensive ingredient in processing chocolate, so any time a large manufacturer can mitigate it's use, they will. Lecithin allows them to use less cocoa butter in high percentage chocolate, so that the chocolate will flow through their molding machines.

In the case of our 80% bars, I would LOVE to use 80% cocoa beans, but it's so thick it's like tar. When coming up with the recipe I faced a crossroad. Do I use lecithin, or do I add cocoa butter. I chose the latter, reduced my cocoa bean content by 10% (to 70%) and increased my cocoa butter content by 10% - just enough so that we could mold it.

Either way, lecithin, when used in chocolate increases it's fluidity by gluing itself to all of the minute solid particles, and creating a slippery surface that the fat can't grab on to.

It's just unfortunate that our regulatory bodies allow it to be referred to as an emuslifier rather than a lubricant, on packaging. I guess "lubricant" doesn't sound as good.

Cheers.

Brad

Natural Chocolate sauce original recipe with decent shelf life ????

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lecithin

"In confectionery it reduces viscosity, replaces more expensive ingredients, controls sugar crystallization and the flow properties of chocolate, helps in the homogeneous mixing of ingredients, improves shelf life for some products, and can be used as a coating. In emulsions and fat spreads it stabilizes emulsions, reduces spattering during frying, improves texture of spreads and flavour release."

"For example, lecithin is the emulsifier that keeps cocoa and cocoa butter in a candy bar from separating."

From what I have read elsewhere it helps the flow properties of chocolate through and in manufacturing machinery. For dark chocolate without lecithin the there is a marked viscosity increase at 90 deg C. For milk chocolate without lecithin this viscosity increase occurs at 60 degrees C.

Apparently the claims regarding bloom are more controversial and whilst it definitely has an effect on tempering and seeding correctly tempered chocolate without lecithin will not bloom under normal conditions.

In my experience anything using fresh cream in largish quantities will have a quite short shelf life unless frozen.

Natural Chocolate sauce original recipe with decent shelf life ????

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

Hello everybody,

I plan to produce some chocolate sauces with the most natural ingredients like the robins chocolate sauces.(organic and fair trade)

I refuse to use any sorbitol, glucose or inverted sugar (I replace it by honey in general in my ganaches...)

Anyone would have a good recipe with decent shelf life and which keeps taste and texture even refrigerated ? to have such a result is it compulsory to use cocoa liquor or lecithin ?

Here I put the typical ingredients from Robins original sauce :

Ingredients Cane sugar*, fresh cream, dark chocolate* (cane sugar*, cocoa liquor*, cocoa butter*, lecithin, vanilla*), butter, cocoa liquor*, vanilla*, lecithin*, salt.

* Certified Organic Ingredients.
Fair Trade Certified Ingredients.

Thanks a lot in advance

Benouse

updated by @benouse: 04/11/25 09:27:36

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

I'm going to get these books from the library but while I have you guys here, can you give me any tips on retaining the circular shape to truffles after they've been dipped and chilled? As I've mentioned before, after my truffles were dipped and chilled, the bottom of them ended up having a flat surface.

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

Cool, thanks again Brad. I think I remember reading about crme frache with regards to making the thick spanish hot chocolate.

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

crme frache is a hoity toity term for high fat sour cream, so unless you want sour cream truffles, I wouldn't use it. Whipping cream is heavy cream (BEFORE being turned into crme frache). There's also 18% MF cream, and (sometimes depending on where you are) a cream called "half and half".

My recommendation is to use whipping cream before it goes sour.

Cheers.

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

Wow! I'll definitely have to take a look at the Chocolate & Confections book. As far as cream goes, do you usually just use whipping cream if it calls for "heavy cream" as Brad mentioned or should I use crme frache which I did find recently in the grocery store?

Thanks

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

Thirding the recommendation on Chocolates & Confections. He does a great job explaining the chemistry/theory, along with providing several decent recipes.

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

Peter Greweling's book is EXCELLENT!

I own a copy, have read it several times now, and every time I learn something new and get different ideas. Money well spent.

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

The first book I bought was Making Artisan Chocolates by Andrew Shotts. I recommend it for beginners, it has an adequate amount of information with a broad range of recipe types.

As you gain more experience, or if you just want an overload of information I recommend Chocolates & Confections by Peter Greweliing.

As far as your melting chocolate, without going into the practice of tempering, your problem most likely is your chocolate was too hot to dip, it should be about 89, which brings me to investment #1 a good thermometer is absolutely necessary, infared is what I think is best.

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

Thanks for the heavy cream explanation. I'll check the percentages. I took the batch of about 35 or so Oreo Truffles I made to class with me last night as well as to work. I was very surprised! Every person was genuinely ecstatic with them. There were plenty of "they're awesome!" remarks, "unbelievable", "whoa!", "dangerously addicting", "i'm in love" and a few other remarks including "you missed your calling". One went into a chocolate coma and the other was bouncing around the walls. They all seemed to enjoy them more than me but perhaps that's because they don't know how much cream cheese it called for. Now many of them want the recipe.

Do you have any suggestions of which chocolate cookbooks to find?

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

Heavy cream IS whipping cream. Usually anything with more than 30% Milk Fat is considered heavy cream, and your whipping cream is probably around 35%

There are some very fundamental chocolate confection making concepts you appear to be missing. I would recommend that you purchase a couple of in depth chocolate cook books which cover some of the "theoretical" components of working with Chocolate.

As an FYI, chocolate is arguably the most difficult confection to work with today, and can be the cause of significant frustration for you if you don't understand how it behaves as an ingredient in your confections. Once you understand it's behaviour, the outcome of your confection creations become almost predictable and you no longer really need recipes. You're able to create your own!

Cheers. Hope this helps.

Brad

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

That's another question I have. I've checked in all of the grocery stores in my area of town and there is no "heavy" cream. All there is is whipping cream. I asked at the bakery and same result. Can I just use whipping cream instead of heavy cream or add a couple tbsp to the whipping cream to make it heavy?

Thanks for the quick reply! I'd love to dip in chocolate but I see I'm not good at that since it didn't coat everywhere and after they cooled, there was that rough bottom to the "balls".

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

I wouldn't call that a truffle...more like a chocolate covered cream cheese ball. You will get the consistency you want by making a ganache with chocolate and heavy cream; no cream cheese needed. Here is a pretty simple recipe you might want to try to start out. Dipping them in chocolate is more complicated, especially if you don't want to have to keep them refrigerated; then you need to learn about tempering. Coating with cocoa, crushed nuts, crushed oreos, etc is easier.

First attempt at making truffles

Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques

I just tried to make truffles for the first time and decided on a recipe for Oreo Truffles from: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Easy-OREO-Truffles/Detail.aspx

Literally, the only thing I can taste is cream cheese and nothing else! Also, after I dipped them and placed them on a the wax-paper covered baking sheet, they were flat on the bottom instead of a round shape. This is what I did:

Crush 9 of the cookies to fine crumbs via rolling pin & ziplock & then blender such as magic bullet ; reserve for later use. Crush remaining 36 cookies to fine crumbs; place in medium bowl. Add cream cheese; mix until well blended.

Chill this cookie/cream cheese mixture in fridge/freezer for 10 - 30min.

Shape into small sized balls (they get bigger when dipped). You can use a teaspoon to measure first ball.

Chill the balls in fridge/freezer for 10min 1hr.

Dip the balls into melted chocolate. Fish them out with 2 spoons.

- Place the ball on the spoon and use the 2nd spoon the pour the chocolate. Then pass the ball to the other spoon. This will keep the ball from falling apart.

Roll the freshly dipped balls in mixture. (crushed oreo cookies, cocoa powder)

Chill the truffles on waxed-paper covered baking sheet for another 20 30min then leave in fridge until ready to eat.

After I dipped them in melted chocolate (maybe chocolate too hot?) some of them broke apart and melted when they came in contact with the chocolate.

Yuck. Where'd I go wrong? Maybe I should have tried a more classic truffle for my first time.

updated by @Dan3: 04/11/25 09:27:36