I run a chocolate festival in Dallas, TX. You can look through our website:
I have listed a lot of the classes that we've done. The most popular classes have been about how to taste chocolate. Also popular has been when we've brought in unique people from out-of-town and had them tell their story.
Well the first problem was to find actual professional chocolatiers cause Cyprus is a pretty small island and without any chocolate tradition. I was planning for something small to see how it goes and then if it went good to be repeated next year, and actually we had sooo much attendance no one ever expected (it was even broadcasted in the news!). In total we had about 15 participations, only 3 of those were 100% chocolatiers, others were chocolate brands giving samples, eg. Lindt, and others were into it as hobbyists.
It took me about 6-7 months actually and I might have needed even more time in the ned cause I work full time and didn't have enough time every day for the organization but i got much help from friends.
The workshops where on filled chocolate demos and tempering chocolate and they both ended with friendly discussions between the audience and the chocolatiers giving advice about chocolate.
For kids we had a chocolate tree decorating session and a fairy tale presentation about chocolate.
It would be great if we could gather as many ideas as possible here to enrich all the festivals! 
Hi Porfyra,
What an excellent idea to organise a chocolate festival! I would love to know more about it. How many professionals did you get together? How did you spread the word? How long did it take you to put it together?
Did you talk about single origin chocolate? You could pick 4 to 6 single origin chocolates and have people conduct chocolate tastings. That seems to be pretty popular.
Also, did you have workshops on just simple hand-rolled chocolate truffles? There are lots of people who would like to make chocolate truffles, but who do not want to get into tempering chocolate. You could also have chefs give demonstrations on using chocolate for savory preparations - like salad dressing, sauce for chicken, chilli chocolate pasta etc.
Anjali
Good luck!
Even though I'm not a professional, after some trips to Brussels I got more into chocolate, (almost at an addiction level) its history and its science and researched the subject deeper. My country is not really known for its chocolate so I had the idea of setting up a chocolate festival for a beginning to see how it goes and help people get more into the real chocolate.
I gathered some professionals and serious hobbyists in the field and we eventually got a lot more visitors than anyone ever expected. Since then potential sponsors also contacted us, so this time I'd like to prepare something bigger, more organized and with more workshops.
We had exhibitions on how filled chocolates are made,real hot chocolate and tempering techniques for this time.
I'd really appreciate any ideas for further workshops or anything you believe would be interesting for someone to see in the next chocolate festival.
Thank you!
The tempering machines used in the Ritter Sport shop are from a company called LCM. They are very good machines, but they are also very expensive and even the smallest size may be more capacity than you need. Ritter obviously has a lot of money to spend, so it makes sense for them to go with LCM.
If you are just starting out and you don't know your demand (you are in Cyprus), it makes sense to be a lot more conservative.
Tabletop continuous tempering machines can cost as little as 5000 ex-works and be able to temper up to 10kg per hour of chocolate (enough to make 100, 100gr bars). Floor-standing tempering machines that can temper up to 20kg per hour start at about 6900, again, ex-works.
Three smaller machines (one for milk chocolate, one for dark chocolate, and one for white chocolate) could give you the capacity to produce hundreds of bars per hour cost effectively. If you are interested, I have a relationship with FBM (Italy) that enables me to offer a 10% discount on tempering machines to ChocolateLife members.
I was able to find a picture online of the 'taps' - looks like any sort of automatic tempering machine could be used. So you could look at a Selmi (various sizes available) - not sure of the pricing in europe but since most are manufactured there it should be less than north america I suspect. Pomati makes various sized machines as well. Chocolate World also sells something similar to the Selmi.
Hi all. I have been to Ritter Sport shop in Berlin and liked their idea of making custom chocolate bars right there with the chosen ingredients of each customer. They had a chocolate tap with continuously flowing chocolate and mixed some of that with the chosen contents eg. Nuts , biscuit etc to put into a mold and then in the fridge.
I would be interested in that tap and theidea of custom chocolate. Does anyone know where I can find one of those taps and how much they would cost approx.in europe?
Thank you!!
Glad you think they are high quality. I have already placed an order.
Thanks for the feedback guys.
Chef Rubber is certainly not a super market. Paul specializes in specialty items for the pastry/chocolatier market. I have never found any of his products to be less than top quality. Chef Rubber does not make the products, but distribute them is small enough quantities that yu are able to buy
The chocolatier I talked to said to not buy any products from supermarkets since they are inferior to the products you can obtain from wholesale distributors in the confectionary industry. Following this advice, since Chef Rubber is not carried by any of these distributors, I thought it may be less quality.
It looks as if I have no choice anyway. They are the only company that I'm aware that sells it ---- thanks for mentioning them.
I am curious as to what you mean by "high quality." I doubt that any vendor is going to acknowledge that his product is of other than high quality.
Yeah I am in the US.
Thanks for the reference, I will look into and call the company to ask about its quality. Thank you Jim.
If anyone else has any other companies that would be great! Thanks : )
I see that you are in the U.S., so you can find it at Chef Rubber: http://www.shopchefrubber.com/Sorbitol-Liquid-4-Liter/ . I don't know about the quality of the product.
Where can we buy liquid sorbitol?
It has to be high quality. I checked with some main top food distributors in the area and they don't carry the item.
Crime against the cacao and chocolate in Brazil.
Watch the film "O N, ato humano deliberado" that describes the terrible attack of biological terrorists that disseminated the disease witch of broom in the cacao plantations of the State of Bahia. The film has an English legend.
The film is in:O nó Ato humano deliberado
In answer to the first question about adding warm cream to warm chocolate your desired combined temp is too much and it breaks, maybe try lowering the temp of the cream. The way I do it with 85 degree C cream onto solid room temp chocolate.
As for the reason not to boil cream, well I read this somewhere and then in my head my reasoning was that the hotter you heat cream the more the proteins denature (unravel) and then when they cool again they agregate with other proteins. And if your emulsion (ganache)is stabilised by the proteins then changing their form is likely to change their ability to stabilise the emulsion. Also practically this works very well, before when I used boiled cream, quite often I would have the ganache break, implementing the method of not boiling cream and only taking it to 85 degrees C I don't have a problem anymore.
Thanks!
Thanks, Tom, for those ideas. I had heard the trick of adding some cold milk previously but not tried it, but I will do so--when needed (as I stated earlier, I have heated some cream and beat the ganache into it).
Why do you think the heated cream (at 41C/105F) is too hot for the tempered chocolate (at 29C/84F), whereas cream at 85C/185F is not?
I am interested to hear that you do not follow the advice of tempering the chocolate when slabbing it, as I have much better luck using the method of pouring hot cream over room temp. chocolate (which, of course, if it is coming from the bag, is already in temper).
Thanks again for the help.
Thanks for the reply, which I found very interesting. Previously I had been doing what you recommend, that is, bringing the chocolate and the cream (plus flavorings) to the same temp., then mixing them. This sometimes worked, but sometimes did not. Some time ago I posted this issue on another forum, and a knowledgeable contributor wrote, "I try to never have my ganaches go under 35 degrees [95 F.] when I work them because under that temperature cacao butter sets....If you are using a chocolate that is at 55 degrees [131 F.] then your liquids can be at 28 [82 F.] ish you will have an end result in theory around 35 degrees. Other way, if your chocolate is at 35 degrees your liquids around 40 ish [104 F.], same result." As you can see, this is a different approach, and since it is what Peter Greweling recommends, I have been following it.
But because I have been having trouble (only with white chocolate) with this method, I will again try what you suggest and see what happens. Thanks again.
I have been experiencing separation of ganache and have sought in vain for answers. When I make ganache by pouring hot cream over chocolate, then stirring, all goes well. But when I temper the chocolate to 84-86 F. (for white) and add cream plus flavorings at 105 F., the emulsion seems to be forming, then breaks with a mass and a separate pool of yellowish liquid. An immersion blender doesn't help, nor does the food processor. The only technique that has worked is to heat several tablespoons of cream and slowly mix the broken ganache into it with a whisk. This has worked every time (so far), although the result does not have the silky texture it should have.
I use several books for making ganaches, but the technique is basically from Peter Greweling (Chocolates & Confections). He states that a slabbed ganache should always be mixed with tempered chocolate. It is his recommended temperatures that I am using. The issue has occurred when I use Valrhona's Opalys white, although sometimes that chocolate (tempered) performs perfectly and mixes without a hitch. The Valrhona bag gives 84 F. as the desired working temperature.
What could it be? Temperature is a consideration, but I am using a Thermoworks infrared thermometer and also a Thermapen to check it. I am tempering with Mycryo, which I use for small batches. The recipe I was using most recently was Greweling's "toucans" (passion fruit ganache), with the change of tempering the chocolate before mixing it with the cream and passion fruit pure (because I was going to slab the ganache).
Any help would be most appreciated.
As Sebastian pointed out, this kind of financial information is highly guarded. You should, however, be able to make a generic analysis. It should be pointed out that Mast Bros operation is completely different from Torres - small vs. large factory.
First, what is the price of beans? Bean to bar makers are paying higher than Fairtrade pricing so estimate around $3500/ton. Add in the cost of shipping - $400 per ton. And the cost of sugar - Organic sugar is $2/lb. These are the raw materials.
Now processing: the beans must be sorted, roasted, cracked, winnowed, ground, counched, tempered, molded and packaged. For small batch operation that might take two people, 20 hours and produce 100 lbs of chocolate. For large factory like Torres - no idea as it is a highly automated process. You will have to research the typical cost of employees in NYC.
Equipment: A small factory might have $150,000 in equipment - a large factory $2-$3M. A portion of the cost must be added in along with all the other overhead - sales, marketing, IT, wages, taxes, websites, packaging, maintenance, travel, utilities, etc. Overhead could run 500 - 1000% of the cost of the beans.
From there you can derive the cost per bar - with plenty of assumptions of course. Most of the costs are variable and controllable by the company.
Or use an industry estimate - one book on specialty food retailing said that the typical retail food cost was 35% of retail so a $8 bar would cost $2.80 to produce.
Hope that helps.
I know what the bars sell for in the stores where with the Mast Brothers bars can go from $7.99-$13.99 but at their factory it is $7.00 per bar or 3 for $20.00.
I haven't been to Jacques Torres for a long time but their bars in retail may go from $5.00 and up depending on which bar.
Cacao Prieto plain bars sell for $10.00 in the retail shops but cheaper whole sale and each store will charge different prices. Hope this helps a bit.
oh, i imagine they'll consider that to be a closely guarded secret...
I may have the exact space that you are describing become available in late spring. You can view a part of it in a video that I recently posted. PM me for contact info or send email to info@emvichocolate.com
Hi Corey,
Do you make plain dark chocolate bars or gluten free items?
I live in the new york city area
I will try to find a way.Thank u Kerry for your advices.I will temper some liquor today and will observ better how it is going.
Do you have a way of checking the temperature of your thermometer or perhaps using another to compare?
The mixture is thick and without stirring it it woult stay (solidified) on the edge of the recipient. my thermometer is electric with a probe (sonde in french).
Sounds on the surface like it should work. When you get down to 27 C - how thick is the mixture? Also how certain are you of the calibration of your thermometer?
Sorry, i ate the end of the discussion:-). So after i put the recipient with the hot liquor in another with cool water until the liquor reaches 27C and put it back to hot until 31C in the tajin.Then I mould the chocolate. I keep stirring the liquor all along this process.
So?
Hi Kerry I agree with you. Here is the way i do the tempering" au bain marie". I use an electris tajin to do it. I put the recipient with the chocolate liquor in it. I control the temperature until 48 C (dark chocolate) after i
Drupa,
It sounds like your problem is in the tempering - it's challenging to temper in a humid environment and you may find that you continue to have problems until you can get an air conditioned space set up to temper. But in the meantime can you tell us how you are tempering your chocolate so we can help you troubleshoot?
I know when I send bars I put them in an envelope or with bubble wrap but also the people who make bars know how to temper and that keeps it from melting.I don't make chocolate except for myself for fun and my tempering is not good,has to be near the cold or it gets too soft,but I would love to be able to try your bar and I know another person who would also be interested.I love being able to discover new bars and to keep on tasting and see things from a consumer point of view.I leave the chocolate making to the people who know how to do it.
hello Adrienne,
I will be happy to send you a bar but i am wondering in what form it will reach to you. I have no idea yet how to do the package to travel towards you without the chocolate melt.Especially because of the problems i have mentionned in my last reply. Can someone help?
