Small-scale Chocolate Storage?
Posted in: Tech Help, Tips, Tricks, Techniques
Jennifer,First, I'll be of no help, so feel free to ignore this, but I am facing the same situation. I am fortunate to be in very low humidity part of the world, and between October and March the way I solve this is that I have a north-facing room with a lot of windows, and by opening and closing the windows I'm able to keep the room at a nearly constant 60 degrees, augmented by a ductless air conditioner (and, though rarely needed) a heater. In this region, our humidity is usually 10% (ranges 8% winter-20%summer), so humidity is controlled by mother nature. I can store chocolates with even fairly high water activity (Aw) (such as truffles) in this room for 4 weeks without appreciable loss of quality, blooming, etc. (Of course, they are in air tight containers and not exposed to light.)But as a non-commercial artisanal chocolatier, I simply shut down operation between March and October, because without a temperature controlled environment, the ambient temperature is too hot for tempering, let alone storage.We have a commercial vineyard nearby, and I talked to them if I could maybe rent some of their lovely dark, cool space -- the problem of course is they have to control their humidity in exactly the wrong direction: they need high humidity and cool temperatures. So they actually ADD humidity. Dead end there.I have discussed with local small construction/remodeling companies building a small room that would have the right temperature and humidity control. With the recession, they are very hungry for work. For maybe 50% more than a commercial cabinet + shipping, they might be able to build a simple room (frame/stucco with heavy insulation) that would work. Temperature control would be fairly easy with a small unit. But again...I'm very lucky I don't need to worry much about humidity.If you find a workable solution, I hope you'll post a follow-up! Best of luck-Bruce
