Days 12, 13, and 14: Chocolate

One of the main focuses of our Superior Pastry course next term will be Chocolate.  We will learn how to melt, temper, and work with chocolate.  We will be making candy, coating cakes, and even making a small chocolate sculpture.  A few days last week we had an introduction to this medium.  One day was spent learning about and working with milk chocolate to make small candies and the next day was spent working with dark chocolate to make truffles.  Even though I've been making my Tuxedo Strawberries for years I really know nothing about the technical methods for professionally working with chocolate.

The first thing we learned was that there are three types of chocolate, milk, dark, and white.  The difference between each kind of chocolate is what percentage of milk and cocoa butter each contains.  The next thing we learned was how to temper chocolate.  When you temper chocolate you heat it to a temperature between 45 and 55 degrees celsius, then lower the chocolate temperature to between 24 and 27 degrees celsius, and then raise it back up to a temperature of 28 to 32 degrees celsius depending on which type of chocolate you are melting.  Tempering the chocolate insures that it will "set" correctly.  Chocolate that has set will be shiny, and hard and can be left out on display without melting.

The day that we worked with milk chocolate and made praline candies shaped like half moons dipped in milk chocolate and we made muscadine which is a praline and cream candy also dipped in milk chocolate and then covered in powdered sugar.  I forgot to take a picture intially so these were the leftovers and don't look that pretty.

My Milk Chocolates

The day we worked with dark chocolate we made almond and coffee flavored candy squares which we dipped in dark chocolate and decorated with walnuts and we made dark chocolate ganache truffles dipped in dark chocolate and rolled cocoa powder.

My Almond Candies and my Truffles

Until next time Au Revoir and Bon Appetit!