Neutral flavored ganache?

I'm looking for a way to make a neutral flavored ganache that could take on whatever flavor is added to it, sweet or savory.

I've been playing around with the idea of making one out of cream and cocoa butter. I realize it wouldn't be totally neutral but at least it wouldn't be sweet. But would that even work? If so, does anybody know what ratio I should try?

Should the cream be below a certain temperature before pouring it over the chopped cocoa butter?

Cocoa butter is a bit expensive so I thought I'd ask you guys before I start doing some trial batches. If anybody has any other ideas on how to achieve that texture without the chocolate please throw them out there!

Just to give you an example of what I'm planning on doing with it is I'd like to make savory pralines with a porcini ganache center and a crunchy duck skin salted caramel coating.

Find more posts tagged with

Recipes Q's

Comments

brian_martin2001

I've read your post several times, and honestly, I'm not sure I'm wrapping my head around what you're trying to accomplish, but it doesn't really matter. As you observed, you wouldn't get a completely neutral flavor with the cocoa butter, so my recommendation would be try maybe coconut oil. This is somewhat cheaper, and you can find several varieties that have a much less intense flavor. Coconut oil is semi-solid at room temperature, so you'd probably want/need to add a thickener (I'd probably go with a gum). Not sure that helps, but good luck none the less.

I would mention, at least the way i'm thinking, that a neutral flavored ganache would probably be almost completely composed fat. I'm really not thinking of any other way to make it. You'd need your chocolate replacement (most likely a fat/fat+a thickener), your cream, and any other flavor you'd be adding to it. That's my 2 cents.

Ryan_79893

Yeah I probably could have written that in a less confusing way. haha The last bit you mentioned was exactly what I was looking for (fat/fat + thickener and cream).

That helps a lot! Thanks Brian!

p.s. any gum in particular come to mind?

brian_martin2001

I haven't the foggiest idea. I'd just do a google search for gum suppliers. Every gum supplier website i've ever checked out has an area where they go over the properties of the gums they supply (some even have the properties of combinations of gums). You might even find the information on wikipedia. The only experience I have with gums is xanthan gum (and some stuff in college years ago, but it was ice cream application) and xanthan, at least by itself, wouldn't give you the right consistency i think. good luck!

Afonso_Tito_de_Morais_164825

Check out CS' Foie Ganache, maybe you can take some hints from how they stabilize it etc

tshewman

Would consider "starting" at about 1:1 ratio (flavored fat:cream) and flavor may be diluted bc of the cream so something to consider. Will likely need a stabilizer as well. The stabilizer chosen will likely be due to factors such as desired serving temp and the like. Great idea btw!

Ryan_79893

I'll look into that Brian! Thanks for the ideas!

Ryan_79893

Will do! Thanks!

Ryan_79893

Thanks for the tip about the ratio. I wasn't sure because I heard that a white chocolate ganache needs a higher ratio of white chocolate than your standard dark chocolate ganache. I'll start with 1:1 and go from there!