Forum Activity for @Sebastian

Having spent some time with my fair share of folks at the FDA - i can say with some degree of confidence that this is on their radar, and good things are not in store for those who habitually violate the standards and/or put consumers at risk.  That said, there's lots of threats to the food system, and not all of them are #1 priority, so it's difficult to say when the hammer will fall, but it will fall.  Remember that pathogens are only one of the category of 'bad things' that reside on shells.  Heavy metals and mycotoxins are also very real concerns.

Almost all sugar is produced - essentially - the same way - there's a series of extraction steps to get the sugar out of the plant, then it's concentrated, then it's purified.  It's at this purification step where you end up with a range of colors - every single region around the world calls their higher color sugars a different name - but they're all effectively the same thing - higher impurity sugars.  That may sound bad (and in some cases, it is - i've been to most sugar refineries in the world and some of them are abyssmal.  In other cases it's just more natural colors and is fine).

Since it's not effective to talk about each regions individual nomenclature (there's literally hundreds of names for the various brown sugars) - the world has standardized how they talk about it in the form of ICUMSA color standards - it's an analytical measure of how dark the sugar is.  Your standard white sugar has an ICUMSA value of perhaps 40-50.  A tan sugar may be ISCUMA 100.  A very dark sugar may be ICUMSA 600.  Not sure you're going to do anything with that, but sometimes the back story is interesting.

The easiest way to get higher color sugars is simply to run it through the washing, crystallizers, and centrifuges less often than one does for a white sugar, leaving effectively more molasses in it.  This typically results in a higher color, but still low moisture sugar (< 1%).  However, in some of the more modern high t hroughput refineries, it's not efficient for them to run like this, so what they do is highly refine everything at the high speed rates, then blend back the previously extracted molassess stream into the highly refined white sugar - sort of 'reconstituting' brown sugar.  These can be much 'wetter' and higher moisture than their counterparts - so it's important to get a specification on your sugar to know the moisture.  As you are aware, high moisture does bad things (tm) for chocolate.

Priscilla -

Continuous tempering machines are not designed for constant changeover. The reason is as you point out - it's not cost-effective to completely clean the internal plumbing and if you're using water to clean you need to let it dry out completely before starting the next batch.

For this reason, people tend to run their machines for as long as they possibly can before changing over. One scenario is to run one chocolate for an entire day, clean the machine at the end of the day, and then let it dry out over night. In most of the workshops I have visited, they have dedicated machines for dark, milk, and white. They size their machines to the amount of each chocolate they need. They might have a 25kg machine for dark, a 12kg machine for milk, and a 4kg for white.

When they have a flavored chocolate they use their continuous tempering machines in a semi-batch mode, taking off the tempered chocolate they need in small batches and flavoring only what they need.

One question I have is about the size of the average batch you are making. Is it a couple of kilos at a time or is it more like 5-10kg per hour or more?

I have been using Rapidura sugar and prefer it over other sugars that I've tried. Mainly for the flavor and the fact that it's organic. I did have an occasion where it seemed too moist so I put it on cookie sheets and heated it in the oven just long enough to remove the moisture. That sugar was from a small package I bought. I always put it in a vegi blender to make it finer before it goes into the melanger. I started buying it in small quantities and just recently purchased a 33 lb. bag from a co-op here in the states. It's actual origin is Brasil. The state side co-op is called Bulk Natural Foods , Tennessee. I can give you the name of the Brazilian manufacturer if you like. Let me know.

Okay I threw something temporary together for the Premier gear/belt replacement - feedback welcome! I would like to know if there's a better thread to post this so please let me know. Thanks!

http://www.instructables.com/id/Premier-Wonder-Grinder-Repair-Belts-and-Gears/

 We've spent the last year trying every cacao bean we can get our hands on, and it's just about time that we're starting to look at which sugar to use. We're currently using C&H Organic unrefined cane sugar for all our evaluation batches, though I'm curious to try Rapadura (sold as Rapunzel in the US). My question before buying it - has anyone used it in bean to bar chocolate? Does it have a low moisture content? I was interested in Zulka but we were having tempering issues (which may or may not have had anything to do with the slightly higher moisture content) - so we've stopped using Zulka and are back to C&H unrefined for now.

If anyone has a sugar recommendation (the less processed, the better!) that has a low moisture content and have experience with it, please let me know - thanks!

Updates and changes to features and functionality

February 1

• Completed a module-by-module check of the quota configurations. Some features that were turned off for some quotas that should have been turned on, were turned on.
• Did an integrity check of embedded YouTube videos. No videos were deleted, but there are 23 videos (out of 231) that may no longer be playable because their owners have made them private. Investigating what to do about those 23.
• Changed the CSS formatting of links to make them more obvious.

January 31

• Created a new profile quota that enables an organizational account to have multiple profiles and to link the accounts of other members of the organization to a shared profile. Turned on Profile Tweaks, FAQs, Profile Forums, Profile Groups, File Uploads, and Profile Pages for this quota. Visit @FBM-srl to see what this looks like. The features in this quota are going to be available to any member for a one-time setup cost of $50. For an annual fee of $50, Organizations will also be able to map a domain name to their ChocolateLife.com profile enabling them to use and brand all of the community features of TheChocolateLife.

January 23

• Added the text of Group Discussions to site-wide search and modified the Search Results pages to display them more effectively. This slows the actual search down but speeds up finding what you're looking for when the results are displayed.Overall it's a very positive improvement.
• Worked with the developers to improve the Tag Cloud module user experience. Added links to the entire tag cloud in the top nav as well to the title bar of the tag cloud block on the home page.

Cream of tartar is a buffered acid, be carefull what effect your added level has to pH.  Keep well above 4.6.  Adding corn syrup is easiest.  How much you need depends on 3 factors as they control crystallization.

- What is your final moisture level.  One percent moisture will increase or decrease the syrup phase by 3%. 

- What is the ratio of sucrose to other sugars.  From the milk (lactose) and any added corn syrup solids.

- What is the final viscosity.  More viscous requires less other sugars to doctor.

Also the colder it's stored the less sugar can stay in solution.

A traditional dulce de leche is just sugar and milk.  The cooking time is long, which continues to invert some of the sugar.  Same thing the cream of tartar does but much slower.  High moisture versions (pudding or flan like) are kept refrigerated as their Aw is too high for good shelf life.  Versions with lower moisture can be grained unless they have additional sugars (invert, corn syrup) added to increase the total solids the moisture can hold at ambient temperatures.

Clay - yeah we've been talking to Dandelion about getting testing done, especially with cacao from our farm in Guatemala as it hasn't yet been imported to the US before in any quantity.

David -

These are all very good questions.

Legally, Sacred Chocolate should not be able to call what they make chocolate because it's outside of the standard of identity for chocolate with respect to shell content.

When it comes to "raw" chocolate there is an increased risk of getting sick because pathogens that would normally be killed during roasting aren't.

Practically, the FDA is not going to do anything until a whole lot of people get sick. At that point the FDA will take a look at these chocolates and may or may not issue guidelines. I don't think that "Big Chocolate" is going to lobby for regulation as the market is too small for them to bother with. Instead they will used theit advanced manufacturing skills to create neutriceutical chocolates "improved" using extracts, as Mars does now.

One thing that many small chocolate makers may not know (but it's something I tell all my consulting clients) is that they are required to register with the FDA as a food manufacturing facility - and there are some specific things they must do, such as having a written, documented, procedure for cleaning beans and removing any metal objects before roasting. By registering with the FDA you give consent to have them inspect your facility and they can fine you or shut you down if they find things they don't like. While you might not want to invest in a formal HACCP plan, having a documented set of procedures that show that you are aware of the issues and that you have processes in place is a very good idea.

Anyone making chocolate should get their chocolate tested at a lab. Plate test, maybe heavy metals. You can specifically test for salmonella and e coli. If you are NOT doing this, you should. Contact your insurance company and see what doing this might do to reduce the cost of your general and product liability policy premiums.

Obviously a US-based opinion as that's where I'm at and where I'm going to base my opinion on, and what I'd love others to chime in on. Rather than just my opinion, I'd love to get a conversation going because I think this may be a larger issue at some point.

So I know Sacred Chocolate is somewhat of an easy target as they do both whole-bean and "raw" chocolate. I don't mean to single them out but they cover both areas I'm interested in so I'll use them as an example. Let me preface this by saying I've never tasted Sacred's stuff and for all I know it could be awesome. I have tasted other "unroasted" chocolate that was awesome.

So, shells first -

On a pure legal front, as far as I understand the FDA regulates the shell content of chocolate to 1.75% by volume:

http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfcfr/CFRSearch.cfm?fr=163.110

Being that shells are around 20% of the weight of the bean (or more, depending on origin and a number of other factors), that would make Sacred in violation of the FDA regulation, right? So how did they even pass a health inspection?

I read the discussion  earlier last year about Paul Young's whole bean chocolate (which I guess was discontinued?) which mentioned similar concerns. But I'm only now finding out that Sacred Chocolate is currently doing this in the US. It blows my mind. And the reasons for doing it are to promote the health benefits of the shell (!). I've also seen people candy-coating whole cacao beans which makes sense from a manufacturing standpoint (who wants to hand peel tens of thousands of beans?) but not necessarily from a health standpoint.

Now, I'm of the opinion Live and Let Live and these folks are entitled to their opinions on what's healthier about eating the shell or whatever, but here's my concern and what I'd love to discuss - Say that a bunch of people get seriously ill from eating Whole Bean chocolate or Raw chocolate or some other "unconventional" chocolate. The FDA comes in and says "yeah, no we need to tighten regulations on chocolate." Suddenly the rest of us will have to jump through extra hoops when it comes to importing, warehousing, and processing raw cacao beans, even if we end up making chocolate from fully roasted, deshelled cacao. More to the point, I could totally see the Craft Chocolate movement in the US hit critical mass and finally garnering the attention of the Big Chocolate companies, who would use any illness outbreak from a small maker as a way to push additional regulations through via lobbyists, making it more difficult for us to operate. Am I being paranoid? Probably. But don't you all remember what happened with Odwalla with their unpasteurized apple juice that sickened 70 kids (and led to many of their deaths) and led to sweeping changes in the juice industry in the 90s? They felt that  unpasteurized was heathier and retained more nutrients. Sound familiar?

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10049198

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_E._coli_case_from_Odwalla_juice

That's exactly the sort of thing I worry about with craft chocolate. It's pretty much a free-for-all and the fact of the matter is raw cacao beans should be a well-documented source with standardized storage and kill steps, regardless of being Raw or whatever. I personally like the fact that Big Government is out of my kitchen when it comes to my cacao processing, but I still consider this a looming issue. Hollywood regulated itself in the 1930s  specifically so the government didn't intervene. Did they go too far? Of course. The idea was ultimately abandoned. I'm just throwing out ideas because, to quote any number of movies: I have a bad feeling about this.

Fudge is a grained caramel, and can have a very wide range of acceptible recipes.  Several questions determine recipes best for your use. 

How are you making the fudge, are you hand beating on a marble slab, in a creamer?

Will you form a loaf on the table to be cut, or cast into moulds or boxes?

Are you looking for ingredient restrictions?

What shelf life are you looking for?

Sebastian -

For what it's worth, when I turned it on, I did not expect to find it in the top nav. I searched for it and searched for it ... and ended up having to ask the dev team where it was when it wasn't where I expected to be. Doh. Homer Simpson moment.

Got it - thanks.  I'm sure that was pointed out somewhere and i've just not been present enough to catch it - thanks.

Priscilla -

I am still not sure exactly what the issue is. I will change your profile quota to " chocolate maker " as I see you have a handfull of cocoa beans in your account photo. Now that you are out of the default member quota group you should be able to see the quota picker. Please let me know if you still can't.

Sebastian -

The Private Notes function is implemented. You can find it by hovering over your name in the top nav. It should be the first item.

There is a twist, however. Right now you can only send Private Notes to people who are following you. This is done to prevent spammers using the Private Notes capability. If you want to connect with someone using Private Notes, the best thing to do is to go to their Profile and Follow them. If their account is set up to accept all follow requests, the Follow button will be replaced by Following. If the member's profile is set to "Approve Followers" then the button will be set to Pending and you will get an email when they approve.

I can turn the "only send notes to followers" off, and it might make sense to do that for the next month or so as members slowly claim their accounts. I will have to think about that.

Speaking of messages - and it's probably because i'm not drinking enough coffee - but i can't for the life of me see how to send a message to someone on the new site.  I've seen reference to private messages, but it's not apparent to me how one actually sends the private message.  Is the funtionality not implimented yet, am i just getting too old to find the new technology, or is there a secret decoder ring one needs to use to find it 8-)

Hey Dave,

Yeah I was thinking about that - I figure there's no harm in experimenting since it's a spare baffle anyway. Will definitely post results once I try!

Something you could try, if you haven't already, is to use some fine sand paper to sand away the dark blotch on the metal connector.  That could fix your issue.  Or...there's a product called DexoIT electrical contact cleaner that you could use on it prior to any sandpapering.  You may just have a bad electrical contact due to oxidation.

Taking a look - notified the JR developer team member who did the data import.

The home brew chocolate group seems to be missing.

I would like to share with all you kind people a recipe I developed for peanut butter cup filling that is the rave to those who try it.

This recipe is not what you would typically find on the web; recipes which contain graham crackers, butter, vanilla and store bought peanut butter.

Nope, this recipes contains freshly ground dry roasted unsalted peanuts, 10X sugar, dextrose and salt (the same ingredients found on that leading brand).

So here are the ingredients for a nice sized batch of filling (about 14 large cups):

200 g dry roasted, unsalted peanuts

40 g confectioners sugar

40 g Dextrose

6 g salt

Directions:

1. Grind the peanut on a course setting if using a peanut butter maker. I have several Salton peanut butter makers. I love that machine unfortunately, they are no longer manufactured, that is why i have several from Ebay. If you don't have a peanut butter maker, you can make the peanut butter using a blender. It will take about 5 minutes to make the peanut butter and you will haver to push the peanuts down towards the blade from time to time until it starts to get creamy. Make sure the blender is OFF when pushing the peanut down. Here is an important tip for the correct texture. Take about 40 g of the 200g peanuts (before you grind them) and pulse 5 to 7 times in the blender and put the slivers aside for later.
2. Finish grinding the balance of the peanut (160 g) and in a bowl, combine the slivers and the peanut butter.
3. Add the sugar, Dextrose and salt to the mixture.
4. Throughly mix. It will be stiff at first but after a few minutes of setting, the filling will become soft and glossy.
5. Put the filling aside while you prepare the chocolate.
6. Now, this is where your imagination takes over, enjoy!

Filling Tips (done by hand):

1. Place a peanut butter cup paper liner (about 1 inch diameter) in a larger container. I use a 1/2 cup measuring cup. You will see why in a moment.
2. Pour about 1 teaspoon of chocolate on the bottom of the liner. You can adjust this amount based on the size of the liner you use.
3. Grab the handle of the measuring cup and gently shake the cup until the chocolate settles flat.
4. Drop 1/2 tablespoon of filling into the cup on top of the chocolate.
5. Shake the cup back and forth with a quick motion. This will cause the filling to settle, spread to the sides of the cup and force the chocolate up the sides ofthe liner.
6. Pour about 1 teaspoon of chocolate on top of the filling and spread with the back of the spoon to cover the filling.
7. Again, shake the cup back and forth until the chocolate is perfectly flat on the top.
8. Remove from measurng cup and let cool and repeat steps 1 through 7.
9. If you have a vibrating table, you can use that instead of shaking the cup by hand. Also, don't shake so hard that the liner flys out of the measuring cup. I already did that.
10. Following this procedure will yield you perfectly flat topped peanut butter cups with just the right amount of chocolate on the sides, bottom and top.

Well, I you enjoy this recipe, if you love peanut butter cups (like the leading brand) you will certainly love these. Also, you can make giant cups or other candy molds. You are not limited to just paper liners.

Best Regards,

Joe C.

I ended up swapping the belt and gears on a Wonder last night and took lots of photos. Will post this weekend!

David -

I am sure that everyone here on TheChocolateLife (and elsewhere) would appreciate an instructable on these sorts of repairs and maintenance. Looking forward to seeing the first.

Desert Indulgence. I like it.

Potomac Chocolate:
@clay: not having to tip the melanger to empty it sounds very nice.

Ben -

Just one of the little things we took a careful look at as we were designing the machine. The fact that bowl comes apart in two pieces so that you can remove it completely is unique. While we wanted it to be efficient (i.e., get to particle size fast) that was not the only aspect of usability that concerned us.

Very interesting topic, however I think the analogy misses on a few points.  Most $100 bottles of wine were originally sold for $20-$50 when new. As they age and get better (not all wines age well, contrary to popular belief) the price increases simply due to supply and demand.  Hence a lot of collectors out there are filling thier cellars up with cases of $20 wines.  In 10+ years, that case of $20 wines *might* be a case of $100 wines.   

Are there winemakers selling $100 for new bottles? of course. But they are few and far between, relatively speaking. And almost all of that is due to reputation.

Secondly, unlike most chocolate makers, winemakers tend to have pure and total control over thier grape production. Many of the finest Bordeux's are from winemakers that have been winemaking for generations. They have grown a reputation, without being able to grow thier production. There's a real difference between a good grape and an amazing grape.  

I know I'm new to the industry and just barely coming out of the hobby, but most of the cacao that I seem to find is a blend of a myriad of different farmers, farming techniques, etc. Further, post harvest ferments and drying can range from great to abominable. All of which is just outside the hands of most chocolate makers. We get what we get and learn to work with it.

I think it's the combination of a bunch of things like this that holds prices where they are even though there are premium artisinal made chocolates vs cheapo candy chocolate. Most of what I've seen for $15+ bars is pure ego, while only some of it is rarity, but mostly ego.  If we can somehow work in something special in one chocolate that isnt in another, that's where I think the prices can and would climb.  

It's not a matter of producing a $100 bar, it's a matter of producing something that becomes worth $100 and people are willing to buy as a matter of value and specialness, and rarity. Elitism is where a lot of high dollar things get thier values.

Hey Paul~

I don't have much experience using any enrobing line, I aquired this enrober this summer along with a package equipment purchase from a local business that had closed some time ago. I really REALLY wanted the melters, and figured that the enrober would be a bonus!  I can tell you that with the help of the previous owner, I got it up and running at my facility and it really is a workhorse.  BUT, totally not the direction that I want my (small hand dipped business model) business heading.  The way that the previous owner used it was to start it running early in the morning and by afternoon, using it to enrobe (not sure if this is common practice) but it seems that by watching the way that the chocolate draped over the enrober, and as it got thicker, the closer that it was in temper?  I dont' have the time for that....I would rather buy another hilliard melter/temperer and dip out of that. 

The Pros that I've seen are: Fast and Steady production, the tanks hold a large amount of chocolate and it's easy to refill with a heated side spout, Easy access to every side of the machine including the loading area, chocolate enrobing area and unloading areas. This machine has a very small footprint ( 3' wide by 16 ' long)...it can serve as a table when not in use I've timed the belt speed to run from start to finish at 10 minutes, which is pretty fast moving when you are loading, unloading and shuffling around trays!  Its got 2 detailers one after the bottomer and one at the end of the line, helps to minimize the "foot" of the chocolate piece.  It uses 2 water heated jackets which are easy to maintain, just ensure that they are topped off each day/use and the machine holds temperature very well.  Both the bottomer and the enrober have seperate water jackets and thermostats. The center cooling unit can be turned on and off as needed manually.  It breaks down into 3 different pieces of machine.   It's a cute machine.  

Cons: uses a roll of paper at the end of the line, after enrobing, which is then transfered onto trays  (con is the disposables cost), another con that I had not anticipated is needing more than just "me" to run it.  obviously need someone to load and a very fast one person or two to unload and rack the chocolates. Anyone else know any cons specific to this unit?  

The plastic belt is going to need to be replaced, probably sooner rather than later, I scrubbed the crap out of it when I got it...the belt has some black spots on it and I may have been a bit harsh on it...I have the name of a local company who does this and I could totally get a price for you, replacement was my next step, then I just decided to sell.

I have a bunch of pictures...not sure how many I can post to  this site...you want me to send them to an e-mail? Feel free to contact me at speckledhenchocolate@gmail.com

Desert Indulgence is the name I went with.

@clay: not having to tip the melanger to empty it sounds very nice.

Tim -

Welcome to TheChocolateLife.

For the sake of members everywhere, what's the name of your company? Want to make sure you are mentioned in the current databases of makers.

David -

If/when you do, document it in photos and post an instructable. You can use the new photo galleries to do this. Title each image with the name of the step - Chocovision Rev Delta Baffle Repair - Step 1 - and so on. And put the text in the description. When viewed in Lightbox mode it becomes a step-by-step guide to repairing the baffle.

Hi Clay,

Beautiful, it looks perfect with the blue hyperlinks.

Thanks,

Joe C.

Yeah we got it for $1k and it included several baffles so we're not dead in the water by any means. Was just curious if anyone had attempted to fix one yet. Another in a long line of fixit projects...

Joe -

Does the blue work better for you?

As an alternative, Indi is selling theirs for $4k shipped.

Erin@indichocolate.com

Lynda -

Thanks for sharing. I am glad to hear that TheChocolateLife has been such a valuable resource for you.

Joe -

Yeah, I know what you mean. I've been trying to find a set of colors that can be used universally in the site using the overall color scheme from the old TheChocolateLife. Still working on it. Part of the issue is that some of the CSS classes are doubled up. So if I change something it might have to work against both a dark and a light background. That makes it tougher.

David -

Baffles cannot be easily repaired as the wires are epoxied into the baffle. Whatever is causing the short is probably buried somewhere between the sensor and the contact wires. Troubleshooting is hard because you have to disassemble the baffle to find the cause of the short.

As you bought a used machine, Chocovision is not obligated to honor any warranty. Did you ask for a good price? Try looking for parts on eBay, too.

Hi Clay,

Great site, excellent resources here.

The only thing I found which may use a little tweaking if that when you move the mouse over a hyperlink, the link changes to a color which is almost the same as the background color. This has caused me to hesitate from clicking on the link thinking something was wrong or the link disappeared, especially when there is a link embedded in the forum since the text is tiny.

Typically a link will remain the same color and it will become underlined when a mouse is moved over it.

It is not a big deal, it just tricked me a few times.

Best Regards,'

Joe  C.

FBM introduced a new machine at SIGEP that I helped them design - the >> RUMBO << .

The design is a hybrid of the Indian wet grinder and a traditional Lehmann melanger. The bowl and the base are fixed and the grinding stones turn. The grinding stones are direct-drive: no belts or chains, and the motor is variable-speed.

The base and the grinding stones are also made of real granite. The people who cut the stones for the RUMBO are the same people who cut the stones to repair actual Lehmann melangers. The grinding stones weigh 45kg each as well.

Perhaps more importantly, the RUMBO incorporates a forced hot air mechanism into the design. You can heat the stones and base before you start grinding so that the fat starts to liquefy more or less immediately. Furthermore, you can keep the air blowing while refining (or not) your choice.

Also, the machine unloads itself. There is an opening in the side of the machine and the scrapers push the chocolate out of this opening. No more tipping the bowl and having to reach in to scrape the chocolate out. The bowl is in two parts and is removable so you can reach the innards for cleaning.

Finally, it's price competitive with a fully-loaded CocoaTown 65. About 10% more. Rated batch capacity is 40 liters, but the bowl is 120L. The more chocolate you put in the machine the longer the processing time. We are looking at ~24 hours to grind/refine to the desired particle size, then transfer to a Kleego50 for conching (in under three hours).

If anyone is interested, please send me a private note and I will send you the catalog page.