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
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
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.
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
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.
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.
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 
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.
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.
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?
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
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".
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.
1) Savour the Salon du Chocolat in Paris
2) Visit a cocoa plantation
3) Expose the psychopathic nature of the Multinational Chocolate Corporations.
Okay, I am neither Jack Nicholson for Morgan Freeman and I don't have a note from a doctor saying my time on earth is coming to an end anytime soon.
I have done a lot in the last 17 years that I've been involved with the wonderful world of chocolate - traveled to about a dozen countries (not nearly enough), met a lot of people (but not all of them), ate A LOT of chocolate (some bad, but most good). And every time I turn around, there's some new place or person to visit and some new chocolate to try.
I definitely want to visit Bali, never been there, and I have always loved the chocolate made from the beans that come from Java, Surabaya, and elsewhere in the region. I have some good friends there and know a top pastry chef at a top hotel so I know I can eat and sleep well in addition to roughing it in the countryside.
But what about you? What's on your Chocolate Bucket (not Charlie Bucket) List?
Tomric carries a badger hair brush - sells in the $100 range. But I've found that the Japanese Varnish brush from Lee Valley works equally well for a whole lot less money.
http://www.leevalley.com/en/wood/page.aspx?c=&p=20040&cat=1,190,43034
Hi Brad
I really appreciate the time & effort you put into this reply.
I am most excited about the advice around 'creating a buzz' - at wholesale, the cost of various ways of creating that buzz is not really that expensive, and is something I should be doing more of. We tried a free chocolate giveaway last year and emailed our database: 2 hours only (unless we ran out first). People were surprised by how much we gave each person, and we did run out after 1.5 hours. And the great thing was, not only did we have a queue snaking for miles (people are still talking about it), we also had our best trading day that month - more than enough to pay for the free product.
I think having read your post, I will really focus on ways to create that buzz, as I have had terrible responses from traditional forms of media and can't see me going back down that road.
Your comments on the free tastings is very thought provoking, and I think have a lot of merit, so I will give this some serious consideration.
I also like the idea of education - if you are sold out two months in advance, that is quite amazing. And it is something that would be easy to implement. I will start working on the best way to get this up and running ASAP.
To get advice like this on a free forum is really exceptional, I hope one day I can make it to Canada and come see your operation and talk chocolate.
Thank you!
Stu
Several months ago I told Clay I wasn't going to contribute to this forum anymore, but many people have contacted me privately and asked me to continue, so here I am.
My advice is as follows:
1. Don't spend a single dime on print, radio, or television media. They're dead ducks. You want to create buzz? Take the $3k you would have spent on a single foodie magazine ad, spend it on chocolate, and hold a big party! CREATE THE BUZZ!! Use Twitter and other social media platforms to carry the buzz and get people down there!
Word of mouth is the most powerful form of advertising. Period. End of story. People WILL visit you based on a friend telling them about you. $3k wholesale worth of product at the very least is $9k worth of retail product, and good for a party of at least 1,000 people. That's a heck of a lot more exposure and BUZZ than you'll get from a foodie magazine!
2. Unless you have buffet written on your sign outside, or "dot org" at the end of your website domain don't sample your products. Go into a fine wine store and ask them to start cracking $50 bottles for you to "try", and see how far you get. Does your grocery store let you start tearing chocolate bars open until you find one you like? NO! Be smarter than the idiots down the street giving product away. You're in business to make money. Your customer knows what they like. Give them the option to purchase a small amount and try what they think they like.
You may disagree with what I just wrote. That's fine. If you insist on sampling your products, then have your competitor's products handy to compare to. After all, your customer won't know whether it's better or worse unless they can taste it side by side. To them, it's chocolate, and it's all good.
3. Focus on educating the consumer. Host classes and other fun events for couples. I've been hosting events on Monday evenings for 2 years now. They are sold out 2 months in advance, create tremendous word of mouth, and every evening, people PAY to become my cusotmers!
4. Give back to the community. Sponsor events for women's and childrens shelters, where 100% of the admission proceeds go back to the shelter. Philanthropists with deep pockets LOVE frequenting businesses they know are out there helping the community. They will send a lot of business your way.
5. Social Media is HUGE. On January 14th we ran an ad through www.LivingSocial.com and sold 1145 boxes of 10 truffles in 24 hours. January is supposed to be one of the slowest, if not THE slowest month of the year in the chocolate industry. It's now one of our busiest.
6. Look at what your peers are doing, and DO THE EXACT OPPOSITE. The bottom line for any marketing campaign is to differentiate yourself from your competition.
7. Every week we get requests from charitable organizations for product for "silent auctions" and giveaways to attendees, with the promise for exposure at their event. DON'T DO IT!!! It's a total waste of money. People are at the event to socialize, and most won't remember where the chocolate came from or the wine, or whatever else is comp'd. Remember: CREATE BUZZ! As a silent auction item, offer the gift of "Chocolatier for a Day", where the winning bidder gets to come into your shop and help out for the day. The organization gets some money from the auction, you get an extra set of hands for the day (yes they will do REAL work), and the purchaser gets an experience of a lifetime. Everybody wins and you have created the buzz. Imagine how many people they are going to tell about their experience!
How much do any of these ideas cost you up front? Zilch, Zippo, Nada, Nothing.
Hope you can put them to work for you in any city but the one my shop is in! HaHa!
Cheers.
Brad
Some additional ideas:
-email newsletters that are courteous (allow unsubscription from a link in the email)
-contests that getpeople involved and coming back
- tours & classes
Hi Folks,
I am in the process of developing a marketing plan for my chocolate shop business, especially as we open new stores. I am interested in any ideas/methods/events people here have used or seen used in the chocolate industry to create a buzz, connect with the community, and grow revenue.
I am happy to reciprocate with a few of our own marketing tools:
- We operate a loyalty club which is growing fast - one point = $1.00, and after 200 points, customer gets $10 voucher. We also have exclusive deals for our loyalty card holders. This is all run through the CRM module in our POS system.
- We offer free tastings to every customer (as do most chocolate shops!)
- We run regular promotions, and have a tasting station set up outside our store most Fridays to tie in with the relevant promotion
- We market on Facebook (ads, fanpage), tourist magazines, but not much other advertising
Any ideas you have will be gratefully accepted. Happy for these to be sent to me privately.
Happy trading,
Stu
Two of the book reviews belongs to the history book. Both are dated August 2 2009.
The New Taste of Chocolate, by Maricel Presilla (2001)
A revised version of The New Taste of Chocolate, by Maricel Presilla was published November 2009. The first version published 2001 is reviewed but no note about a revised version.
A second updated version of The True History of Chocolate, rewritten by Michael Coe was published October 2007. The first version
of The True History of Chocolate published 1996 is reviewed (Written by Michael Coe and his late wife Sophie). The obvious choice would have been to review the second edition.
I can't evaluate the offering from C-spot without a trial version. Currently this looks like a gamble and probably a waste of money.
They rate more than 700 Bars and 300 'Boxed Chocolates".
Annual Membership is $19.
Hey Sarah,
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If you have any questions just let me knowI have been playing with them for a little while now...
