Forum Activity for @Rochelle

You should just email Fairtrade USA as they will have a data post of all certified people.

I want to start using Fair Trade and organic chocolate that is grown specifically in Africa. I have seen on Fair Trade USA's website, the cocoa grower co-ops, however, I'm looking for couverture. Can anyone suggest a company that is producing couverture from these certified growers?

hola I bought a new panning machine , but I don't know very much , all new to me . does anyone know were to buy , the shinning product, ect ,,, any help would be great ,steve

[Note - poster lives in Costa Rica.]
[Note -Original blog post is here:

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Hi - I was re-rereading one of Peter Greweling's books tonight and he really emphasizes using tempered chocolate when making slabbed ganache. I never use this method as I use so many different chocolates when making different ganache recipes. I would never have the time to temper them all. He says it makes for the creamiest consistency. I use the warm cream method over finely chopped chocolate.

Anyone use his method out there? Or has anyone tried just melting chocolate to get out all the crystals and then adding their hot cream?

Thanks!

Megan

Hi Everyone,

Does anyone use Sicao chocolate? It is owned by Barry Callebaut as I understand it and manufactured by Callebaut in Singapore and I thought was one of the best chocolates around (I am based in Australia).

I would VERY much appreciate any thoughts as I am trying to use VERY good (but affordable) chocolate for my entire production and it has been questioned by judges in a recent show I entered it for judging in.

A Google search seems to give favourable feedback - nothing negative - but I would appreciate any feedback please.

Thanks!

Colin

Tom:

I missed Nick's mention of 90gr molds and so your math is correct ... but only by assuming you can get every single gram of chocolate out of the machine. In my experience, that is simply not possible, and it is misleading to suggest that it is. This is a situation where your being preciseis misleading. 125 molds, maybe. 130 molds I could even get down with, but exactly 133 molds, sorry.

You explained why someone would not want to empty the bowl - the dosing becomes less accurate as the bowl empties. But there is another, and far better, reason not to empty the bowl that has to do with throughput. Even if Selmi does make an accessory to keep the bowl pressure more constant.

Also, in my experience talking with many owners of Selmi machines, the tempering is rarely perfectand often starts to suffer when the bowl starts emptying during normal production. This is because there is a very small mass of chocolate in the bottom of bowl near the melt point and you are dumping tempered chocolate into the bowl (which can be 10C or more cooler) and there is no chance to melt out all the crystals before it goes through the tempering pipe again. This can lead very quickly to over crystallization. I understand the mechanics and physics of these continuous tempering machines quite well.

And yes, the augers can be removed from FBM machines and they can be washed with water.

And still, Tom, you misunderstand. I can have biases. I don't have to be perfectly neutral about everything (or anything!). I get to have opinions and I get to express them freely. One of the reasons TheChocolateLife now counts nearly 7,500 members in over 140 countries is that I do have opinions, and I do express them. People want to know what I think. Here's one - there's nothing magic in the air or water (or equipment or cocoa beans) that automagically makes chocolate made in Belgium better than chocolate made anywhere else -- just because it comes from Belgium. It's just marketing hype.I think that the small batch bean-to-bar craft chocolate movement is making a lot of the really interesting chocolate in the world right now.

I don't keep it a secret that I sell equipment. I started to sell equipment in part to cover the costs of hosting the site and because I wanted to get out of the business of shipping chocolate bars. It's right up front on the home page of the site that I sell equipment, and what I equipment I sell. There is no hidden agenda and the site does not exist just to sell equipment. I sell Chocovision tempering machines, I've sold Bakon melters, I've sold CocoaTown grinders. I've even sold a couple of Selmi Pluses (through Tomric). More importantly (for me and for ChocolateLife members), FBM worked with me to create a program that made it possible for me offermeaningful discounts on continuous tempering equipment to ChocolateLife members around the world.

And, rest assured, I do my very best to make sure ChocolateLife members are educated about equipment purchases large and small.

Hi Clay and Nick,

First of all my calculation is quiet good. I see that Nicks moulds are 90 gram so I calculated 12000 gram divided by 90 and this is 133,33, sorry I missed the 0,33

why wouldn't you want to empty the bowl? The tempering is perfect, also when the bowl is almost empty. It is correct that you cannot dose exactly the same quantity of chocolate because the tempering screw is not completely filled with chocolate during the transport. The dosing is only perfectly accurate when you have a completely filled bowl and the pressure on the chocolate is perfectly the same all the time. We can have a special accessory where you can perfectly dose nomatter how much chocolate is in the tank, but therefore people can contact me.

I must disagree that you can work also with other automatic tempering machines with inclusions. what will you do with the nuts allergy? The EX systems is possible to open completely and wash the machine completely with water. Kindly confirm if this is also possible to wash the machines with water that you represent Clay.

Working with inclusions was possible with our previous range of machinery, but we did not recommend because really if you cannot open the machine, you cannot wash the machine with water to remove all the inclusions out of the internal system.

I do not want to fight with you Clay, I know you represent another brand and you talk for your business, like everybody does, that's normal but I just think that the people should be informed well before they buy a machine that is a big investment for our customers. I thought from the beginning that this site was the goal. To inform the people very well about all around the chocolate....

Many regards

Tom

Tom -

You still have not explained what is "new" about the "new generation" of machines that makes it possible to deposit inclusions so easily.

The size range you are talking about, 2-3mm, and the percentage you are talking about - 20% - is something that can easily be handled by a number of other machines, including those from FBM, and have been capable for some time.

So, I am curious to know what's so new about the new generation machines that sets them apart from the old generation machines where working with inclusions was not possible.

Nick - Just FYI, the number of tablets per batch Tom gives (133) is a kind of strange number as the Color has a 12kg working bowl. The number of bars you get depends on the volume of the mold cavity. If you were depositing 80gr bars you'd get more out of 12kg than 133. Also, these are continuous tempering machines so there should be no concept of "batch." For a number of reasons you never want to get close to emptying the bowl during normal production. This will introduce variability into the weight of the deposit and cause changes in temperature that will affect tempering and the viscosity of the chocolate.

Continuous tempering machines operate under very different principles than batch machines and the two should not be confused or mixed.

:: Clay

Hi Nick,

A color EX is 9900 euro and it has a dosing system and vibrating table, that's not 20.000$

you can mix the inclusions in the machines tank and create 133 tablets per batch in no time. (if you have enough moulds)

If you dose too much chocolate, you can just scrape off the excess of chocolate and let it flow back in the tank.

Tempering screw can be easily removed and the complete system can be washed with water.

regards

Tom

Hi Clay, yes $20,000 is a little out of my price range!

My molds are 3/8ths deep and 90 grams in weight which allows for most inclusions to be added as the first layer of chocolate dries. Assuming they fit I can then add the remaining chocolate and scrape off the excess cleanly, leaving a nice, flat base (which is what I'm after). Most problems are caused by nuts - I can zap them in a blender but they then tend to come out too small and leave an insignificant taste and texture. But if they're too big then of course I can't scrape without losing some of the nuts back into the machine, which obviously I don't want to do. I've also tried to pour chocolate delicately into molds but find that, without scraping, the bars can have up to 20% more chocolate than the customer will be paying for. For now I'm individually cutting the inclusions by hand - be they nuts or dried fruit - which works ok but is very time consuming. The other way around it would be to allow the inclusions for poke out from the chocolate base but it makes the package looks lumpy and I'm not sure about shelf life if they aren't fully enrobed

Not sure if there's a better solution but if anyone has one I'd love to hear it.

Thanks,

Nick.

Hi Clay,

I'm sorry, I did not realise that this information was not on the website. in the new generation of the tempering machinery we can put inclusions upto 2-3 mm. we can add 20% inclusions in the tank.

We now also have an automatic moulding line for this so people can create bars, napolitains etc with inclusions. I think that this is big news for the market to share. No more mixing chocolate by hand with the inclusions in a bowl, just put them in the tempering machine and dose....

Regards to you Clay, good to hear you are well !

Tom

Nick:

What sizes are the inclusions and what's the ratio of chocolate to inclusion? That'd help us understand better what you're working with and how we might be able to help you address your production challenges.

Assuming, of course, that you aren't looking to spend $20,000 to solve the issue.

:: Clay

Tom:

I don't see any mention of the ability of your "new generation" of machines to handle inclusions. Can you please let the community know what the maximum size of inclusions your machines can handle (in mm) and what the max percentage of inclusions that can be handled (ratio of chocolate to inclusions) and of the inclusions are handled both with the measured depositor and with the depositor plates.

I don't really mind too much your not actually answering Nick's question - but it is not okay just to post a link to an equipment vendor's site where the answer to the question is not immediately apparent.

I hope you understand.

:: Clay

Hi Nick,

Our complete range of tempering machines has been upgraded to the 'New Generation' where you can work with inclusions in the chocolate.

http://www.selmi-chocolate.it/eng/tempering/plus-ex.html

Regards

Tom

Hi All,

I want to use some new bar molds I've bought to include caramelised nuts and other inclusions and I want to have a professional appearance with the nuts enclosed within the bar and the shell smooth. I've molded them as i would a bonbon so that there is a shell of chocolate, then dropped nuts into the shell before filling with chocolate. My problem with that is that when I then cap them off it looks messy and 'homemade', for want of a better word, because of the nuts. I also can't use whatever is scraped off as I can't return it to the tempered chocolate (as there are nuts within it), so I'm left with lots of waste. I've also found that the bars tend to curve slightly out of the molds when I fill them so that I can't even scrape them clean within the mold.

Are there any obvious ways of sorting this out? I could just fill the molds and drop the nuts in at that point but I like the idea of not having any of the inclusions showing.

Thanks in advance,

Nick.

Hi Everyone!

Just in the process of finalizing the equipment I need to purchase. Right now, we are using a Chocovision Rev Delta to temper our chocolate. It works great, but is way too small, and we need something more automized.

We make "raw" chocolate and use a liquid sweetener. Again, works surprisingly well so far (both tempering by hand and tempering with the Delta), but would you know if the FBM Chocolab 2.1 would be able to "temper" chocolate that uses a liquid sweetener? How do the technologies differ between the Delta and the Chocolab for tempering?

Thanks so much for your help- it is much appreciated.

Thanks for sharing Thomas. Clay, I wonder if these two individuals, Ake Burchardt and Henning Jorgenson are still with us today? Would be a great interview on the Heritage Radio Network!

The April June 1955, edition has an article about West African cacao before Ivory Coast was a big player. Looks like Ghana was a significant producer before the fall of Brazil in the 80's. "The Quality of Raw Cacao and its Affects on the Manufacturer" in the same issue is another interesting read.

I can't stop going through it.

Tom:

I couldn't get your link to work for me. I went to Google Books and then entered " Restoring Chocolate's Old-Time Flavor" into the search box and found the text you mentioned. Here's a link that should work .

What a great find! I am l ooking forward to reading this.

http://http://books.google.com/books?id=dN0OAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA20-IA34&dq=cacao+dominican+republic&hl=en&sa=X&ei=8qA8UYSqN8H90gGO5oGYAw&ved=0CFsQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=cacao%20dominican%20republic&f=false

I found this journal or newsletter on Google books and found this section fascinating. I provided the link and than you go down to: July-August 1953, Vol. 2 ns 43-44. There is a section titled, "Restoring Chocolate's Old-Time Flavor". Very similar to what I currently read about the future of fine flavored cacao.

Perhaps tempering it by hand so that you don't need seed?

Something went wrong with my current batch at home. It's a relatively large batch for me so I'm trying to rescue it. I originally used 2kg cacao liquor, 1 kg cocoa butter, and 1k sugar. It ended up very runny to the point where it wouldn't all stay in the same side of my Revolation as some would run back through the bottom. When I molded it, it just never solidified, maybe finally overnight but not in the 75 mins it normally does and definitely not tempered. I thought perhaps I had too much cocoa butter so I added in 1 kg of store-bough Callbut chocolate liquor, and then another. Still no luck, just to thin.

It's the best flavor I achieved so far so I'm really frustrated. Any ideas and can it be saved?

Brad:

While I appreciate your offer to the members, I make the money to support TheChocolateLife community by offering advertising and sponsorship programs to companies that want to sell products and services to members.

By making your offer without contacting me first you have undermined some of the relationships I have with advertisers and sponsors. I am closing down comments to this post for that reason.

Your advertising your product in this way is the same - from my perspective - as if I owned a chocolate store and you walked into that store and started selling your products. I can only assume that if I walked into your storefront in Calgary and started selling someone else's chocolate that you'd have a problem with that.We have had this discussion before - in private and in public. TheChocolateLife is my place of business and I ask that you respect that and consider that fact when making posts.

If you want to offer your product commercially to ChocolateLife members you can ... through the proper channels. One of the things I look for is a pricing structure that provides a discount to ChocolateLife members PLUS a commission to me for referring any business.

:: Clay

PS.Classifieds is for USED equipment so if you want to sell off youroldmachines you can.

Thanks for the advice on Kickstarter.

With regard to tempering, it's not tricky if the thermocouple is accurate.

Cheers.

Sounds interesting Brad.

If you need upfront funding you may want to use Kickstarter (kickstarter.com) to get people to signup for the machine up-front.

Now, I can't help but wonder if v.1 of your temperer can beat the more established/mature machines on something as tricky as tempering.

I'd definitely love to see that.

It will be able to run with as little as 2lbs, but should hold around 10 just fine - about the same as a pavoni

What about its volume capacity?

It's going to have a baffle inside similar to the others I've mentioned, except that the baffle will be offset from center a bit more so that there is more room in the working area of the bowl.

Hi Brad, it sounds interesting.

What is going to be the machine's volume capacity?

Is going to have a wheel/scraper attachment?

Thanks,

Omar

Sounds great. There certainly is a demand for the machine you are describing. I wish you all the best with this endeavor!

i ll try one ASAP if they are any good will def get a few more.

Well everybody, my cup runneth over with frustration at the table top tempering machines on the market today.

I am tired of replacing motor after motor, and control board after control board on the tempering machines that are currently on the market today.

Pavoni Mini-Temper = FAIL (service, every control board, every motor, and control board logic)

ACMC = FAIL (all motors and all plastic parts, and the chocolate volume is too small)

Rev 2 = FAIL (control board logic and fan and heater, and the chocolate volume is WAY too small)

...and WTF is with lightbulbs as heating elements??? Don't these companies know that incandescent lightbulbs are a thing of the past?

Note that the failure is not on just one machine. I own SIX of each!!!

I pulled the trigger and started the design of my own table top tempering machine. It will have the following features:

• industrial strength Motor OUTSIDE of the heating/cooling chamber
• Control board OUTSIDE of the heating/cooling chamber
• Seperate motor control (ACMC has this, but not Rev 2 or Pavoni)
• 5 programmable and automatedtempering cycles
• all stainless steel construction
• LCD style touch screen controlpanel (no more buttons to wear out).
• No light bulbs as heat supply (heating element and fan combination)

These machines will be designed to withstand the amost abusive staff, will be designed torun 24/7, and will be made from parts that can be ordered off the shelf from pretty much any motor supply place or hardware supplier.

The cool thing will be how the programs work. There will be 3 set points (similar to the Pavoni). However unlike with the Pavoniyou can do what you want with them. For example, The tempering cycle may be set like 43c to 27c to 31.5c. As the day progresses and the chocolate begins to thicken, you switch to program 2 which increase the temperature 1 degree. The 3set points would then be 32.5 to 32.5 to 32.5. Maybe your chocolate continues to thicken. You could program the machine to do 33.5 to 33.5 to 33.5, to make the chocolate more fluid.

OR...

Maybe you work with5 different types of chocolate, and each has a specific tempering cycle. You could program the machine to operate 5 different cycles automatically depending on which chocolate you are using that day.

In our shop, we will reserve program 5 as our heating and holding program. At the end of the day, our staff will set the machine to program 5 (43c to 43c to 43c), turn the motor off and go home. The machine will take the chocolate to that, and hold it until the next day when my staff arrive, set the machine to program 1 and start the bowl turning again. At that time it runs through it's cycle, and in an hour it's automatically back in temper, and ready to use.

I will offer a 3 year unconditionalwarranty on the failure of all parts due to manufacturer defect (not user defect), and the machines will hopefully be priced around the $1500 dollar mark.

No more cheap plastic parts, and failing motors.

Who's interested?

Cheers

Brad

Paul,

If adjusting the temp, and working with a larger volume doesn't remedy the situation, another thing to consider is moisture. Depending on the humidity of your working environment, frozen centers can collect condensation very quickly after removing them from the freezer. They can develop a thin layer of frost that can then melt into the warm chocolate, causing it to thicken and seize. Also, along with natural oils, freshly grated lemon zestcontains somemoisture. You can try using a drop or two of pure lemon oil instead of the zest.

I use Valrhona Ivoire, and it quite fluid. It's very hygroscopic though, and will absorb moisture from the air. I had anopen bag that Imisplaced, and when I found it and tried towork withthe remaining chocolate, it was very thick. You might want to temper a small batch without adding anything to it, and try dipping some room temp items, just to be sure it's not the chocolate that is the problem.

Ah, I'm with you - thanks, that's making sense, and rather fascinating. A tricky issue to manage if that's what's going on. I'll have a shot at working at the highest possible temperature, as you suggest, and maybe a larger volume of chocolate to dip in.

If that doesn't give satisfactory results then perhaps go back to the moulding route, as Daniel suggests

Paul:

There's another way to think about this.

Chocolate will continue to crystallize at a constant temperature (that's why it tends to thicken over the course of a day in a tempering machine even if nothing else changes).Cooling the chocolate induces faster crystallization. This cooling might be very local (within a few mm of the surface of your frozen center), but it can effect a very real change in the chocolate over time as the crystals are mixed in and spread.

So - while the temperature might not change "significantly," you are inducing faster crystal formation in the chocolate that's left behind in the bowl.

Hi Clay, Daniel,

THanks for the thoughts...

I hear what you say about the cold centres cooling the couverture too quickly, and maybe that is the issue - but as the centres spend relatively little time in there, and more importantly take with them out of the bath of chocolate that portion which has been cooled, I suspect the amount of heat 'drain' isn't actually that significant. Also, I'm not seeing a dramatic drop in chocolate temperature on the thermometer. But on the other hand I don't have a better theory

Taking the moulded route rather than dipped could make sense, and maybe I should give that another shot. I tried it before, but probably wasn't using suitable moulds - the main problem for me was getting a decent (not too thick, not too thin, reasonably even) shell thickness.

Like Clay says the cold chocolate center will cause your couverture to cool down super fast. Perhaps this soft filling is better suited as a molded chocolate piece instead of a dipped piece ? The Vahlrona Ivoire is excellent couverture.

Paul:

The thing that occurs to me right away is that your centers are coming from the freezer and they're cooling the chocolate really, really quickly causing the cocoa butter to crystallize a lot faster than you expect.

First thought is to raise the temperature of the chocolate to as high as you possibly can and still keep it in temper. After dipping a couple of centers, stir the chocolate and check to see what temperature it is, and adjust accordingly.

Now - this may introduce other issues, such as the shells cracking because of the differential in temperatures.

Greetings chocoholics!

I'm having trouble dipping truffle centres in white chocolate, and I'm hoping someone can help out...

I'm dipping by hand, small batches, and using Valrhona Ivoire. Heating with a double boiler, following Valrhona's suggested temperature curve, and seeding with chips of the Ivoire.

Also - and this may be significant I'm adding a very small amount of lemon zest to the chocolate.

The problem I have is that the melted Ivoire isn't quite fluid enough, and seems to become less fluid after I start dipping. On its way down to 79/80F it seems to have a good consistency, but less so once it has reached the lower temperature and is then heated to working temperature.

I expecially want a fairly fluid chocolate here as the centres that I'm dipping have to come more or less straight out of the freezer (they're quite creamy, and too soft at room temperature to dip), and I want them to spend as little time as possible in the chocolate... and the thicker consistency (compared to the dark chocolate I'm working with) is making this difficult.

Can I thin the chocolate slightly with cocoa butter perhaps? Or am I maybe not being quite careful enough with temperature?

Another update from Saturday....

So my husband goes in to work and it has melted the chocolate fine. It's nice and warm and the whole bowl is melted.

So from when I used it friday and turned it off because it was tempering horrible and then turning into sludge in the bowl, it melts over night to it's right set temperature.

Any thoughts on that? Why it can't cycle and temper but can seem to keep the heat? Could the heater fan be working intermittently? Or maybe the combination of the fan not working and the block not keeping heat...

Today we have a friend who is a mechanical engineer coming to look at it, because maybe someone else's eyes can see what we can't...

I might try to make it come to temper if I have time...or I might put it back on the sidewalk again with the free sign.