New chocolate business / tempering machine / help!?

  • Thread starter Thread starter NervousT
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NervousT

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Hello!

I have just managed to get some of my fledgling company's chocolates into a small shop in a upmarket location and am starting to think about making choc on a larger scale for farmers markets etc and making in more bulk at christmas, valentines, easter etc,... last easter I did very well selling lovely easter eggs from a deli (he took 50 per cent but it was practice really and to see if anyone would buy my choc!People were very kind to me and encouraging)

Now I know this is the way I want to spend my time, even though it can be an exasperating, time consuming and temperemental substance at times, I love it and intend to keep going.

I've now got my environmental health certificate for making it at home, and insurance, so I'm serious and people are starting to realise that.

But it took me 2 weeks of hard labour to make the eggs using a rev 1 machine which has now broken, must have overused it!?

I have been making truffles and things since which are less tempering reliant but I have to admit I can't temper properly by hand and I want to get back to moulding etc, making nice lollies etc.

Does anyone have any advice about the next step for me - should I invest in a larger tempering machine, or can anyone give me some good instructions on how to temper on a granite slab - how much chocolate can you do this way and how long does it take, I take it I would need to buy a melter too, but it would still be way cheaper than a tempering machine, and although I'm confident I can sell alot of chocolate one way or another, I'm reticent to get a really expensive machine when I am still such a small 'company'.

I'm in that strange limbo between hobby and business and I don't want to be stuck here! Can anyone relate? None of my friends are in food, let alone chocolate, I'm doing this all alone and it feels quite isolating at times, I'm glad I've got you to talk to though!

Thankyou in advance for your resposes,I REALLY appreciate it.

(There is no such thing as a chocolate reject - if you can fit it in your mouth, it wont be rejected!!)
 
I say go for the big time! Invest and maybe your business will take off!

Try contacting Celtic Food Machinery - they are a local company (to me) but I think they could cater for most demands.
 
as a lending executive to business , make your product suit the quipment you have, if you buy non commercial grade equipment it wont do the job and not last.

so what products can you make on teh slab ?
use hand moulds, the best quality you can afoord
easter eggs are your biggest seller so get hand moulds
let the business grow
you have free labour capital will weigh down your business

For a double boiler be
careful not to have the water boiling or touching the bottom of the upper
vessel. It sounds from your description like you might have the heat
cranked up too much, even given convection from the bottom vessel to the
top. Be patient. Dark chocolate can be taken up to about 115 degrees F
and milk chocolate can be taken up to 110 degrees F.

Once you've gotten a complete melt, letting the chocolate cool slowly while
stirring it or working it will encourage the cocoa butter to arrange itself
in a way that is particularly useful for making candy. This is 'tempering'
the chocolate.

Turns out that cocoa butter molecules can arrange themselves in a variety
of ways [six that I know of] and it is these different arrangements that
determine the melting temperature of the chocolate. The respective
melting temperatures range from about 60 degrees F to about 97 degrees F.
The one you're looking to get is the most stable form, and has a melting
temperature of 93 - 95 degrees F. Which is good, because it means that
your chocolate will tend to be that way, as long as you're patient. It
also means that the chocolate is going to feel delightfully cooling in
your mouth.

So, you've taken your chocolate up to 110 -115 degrees, and that has had
the effect of breaking up [melting] all of the cocoa butter molecules.
Now you want them to arrange themselves in a stable arrangement; but you
also want to manipulate the chocolate now that it is a liquid.

There are a couple of strategies for encouraging the cocoa butter into
its stable arrangement. As mentioned above, stirring it or working it
with a spatula will tend to bring about the proper 'crystallization' of
the cocoa butter molecules. Another technique is to 'seed' the molten
chocolate by putting in little pieces of solid chocolate. The molten
cocoa butter then will do a kind of follow-the-leader and arrange itself
after the fashion of the solids. Which is what you want. The hazard
with seeding your chocolate is that you might get little air pockets
associated with the solid pieces. I tend to just stir the chocolate.

Traditionally, small batch chocolate is tempered on marble slabs. Just
pour it on and work it with a spatula until it becomes kind of
slushy-mushy. The next tricky step is to maintain enough heat to keep the chocolate
molten, but not heat it up so much that it forgets how to arrange itself.
This is where the 85 - 90 degrees F comes in. [I think the heating pad
idea sounds cool]. The marble slab will retain some of the heat. Be
careful about using the same vessel in which you heated the chocolate.
I know it's convenient, and that's what I do, you just gotta be more
careful about over heating the chocolate.

Overheating the chocolate will make the cocoa butter separate from the
cocoa solids, and that's a bad thing. Indication that you're overheating
the chocolate is either chocolate bloom in the hardened chocolate or out
and out separation of cocoa butter in the chocolate soup.
 
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