Go to the Recipe: How to Make Artisanal Chocolate At Home — No Special Equipment Required
The best recipe is the one that you did not know you wanted. Thank you for sharing.
Oh my god, so glad to see Nick back. Great recipe and video
Nice! Guess I need/want a grindometer now (TIL that it exists)...
Who is the manufacturer of those white bowls?
How are those Joules in the background hanging from the shelf? Is it magnetic?
No salt?
Such a nice place to film, so jealous of who owns that room ngl
Excellent to see Nick again!
what is the tool he used to scrape measure the finest of the grind of the chocolate? It was a metal bar with measurements on it...
We missed you Nick!
I loved the main video. The supplemental videos were so lack luster, it reminded me of my sister making her kids interact with me when my nuclear family came to visit. Sad face.
I also want to know lol
Was that an old video or is Nick back? Miss the old team, Ben, Riley, Nick, hope they are all kicking goals.
I can answer my own question, that metal bar is called a "grindometer."
Am curious.......when using the blender, were the nibs frozen first? Either in a freezer, or in a container w/ dry ice or in some LN2 and then blitzed?
I only ask bc that's what I do to make things like a roasted pecan flour or buckwheat flour.. Esp the LN2, makes it REALLY fine. Inquiring minds want to know.... :-)
I feel like they just need to do a studio tour video going through all their equipment ant setup
Would using Pate de Cacao also work with this method? I wonder because the packet states its for chocolate making and it seems cocoa paste would work when combined with cocoa butter.
There’s a bit of info about cryo grinding(?) almond flour in the macaron masterclass, apparently you have to use liquid nitrogen to make it super super fine
How did you get raw cacao fruit in or into the US? Do you have a provider or is the Agro import policy that flexible? I ask because I would love to be able to bring some back with me next time I go home! Fascinating video. Very well done...
This is exactly why I asked......just not sure of the uM measurement
The foot of the base of Joule is magnetic, so presumably the shelf it is stuck to is made of metal.
Hi there, for this one no we did not experiment with freezing, we were really trying to make it as simple as possible.
Hi Matthew, Pate de Cacao is simply 100% cocoa nibs milled with zero added sugar or added cocoa butter. so yes it will work, you can simply add the ratio of sugar you want to it. That would be in the same direction of just buying already refined and ready to temper chocolate.
Is a cacao butter the 100% responsable of tempering? in that case, can we replace cocoa powder with any other, example pistacho powder?
ChefSteps, what are your thoughts/experience using Cocao Butter Silk, which can be made by sous vide?
https://chocolatealchemy.com/silk#cocoa-butter-silk
Do you know why regular granulated sugar would not melt enough during the melting step? Or was there just no considerable difference compared to using powdered sugar that it wasn't worth the extra effort in dissolving? Wondering if the 'texture in the tooth' is from this or simply just because it wasn't conched. Thanks for this recipe!
Francisco Migoya has some great tips on this beta 5 crystal method:
https://www.saint-honore.me/blog/tag/chocolate
It is so nice to see Nick back.
Do you have recipes for Milk and White chocolate with this method?
Just made this - dead easy! One question though: the chocolate for me almost tastes like the German "Eiskonfekt" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ischoklad
Should I just reduce the amount of cocoa butter or am I doing something else wrong here?
You can play with the ratios, we did a little higher ratio of cocoa butter to cocoa mass to help with the ease of mixing. the higher ratio of the cocoa powder you go the thicker its going to get.
In the works and coming soon. They are not quite as simple as this one and will require a blender.
Hi Ray! Great question. The sugar does not get hot enough to get to its melting point, and is not fat soluble. There is no water present to melt the crystals. During conching the particles of sugar and cocoa mass are being ground to a size that is smooth to your pallet, and suspended in the cocoa fat.
It is a super helpful method to get good consistent results in tempering. It is essentially pre tempering the cocoa butter, then using it for the seeding method. For this activity we wanted to go as quick and simple as possible.
Good thought! I had the same one and am experimenting with that exact combo at home right now. haven't found the right ratio quite yet, the nut fats at too high of a ratio seem to throw the cocoa butter out of wack. let me know if you play with it and get some good results.
Nick has been back with us since last spring or so.
Great, thanks - will give it a try!
If we’re using the sous vide method to temper, do we need to let the mixture cool first or can we go direct in the bag from melted?
Directly in the bag works great.
I'm getting close!
My end result was soft to the tooth. I think I did not temper correctly.
Here is what I did:
I followed the recipe's proportions.
On the lowest heat possible: Cocoa butter melted then I added in four batches the softed powders while keeping the surface temp between 118 and 125°f.
When everything is melted, I put it immediately in a sous vide bag, then I dump the sous vide bag in a water bath at 82°f.
Every minute, I take the bag out and squize to mix. I do this during 6 minutes.
I raise the water bath temp to 90°f.
Every minute, I take the bag out and squize to mix. Once the water bath reaches 90°f, I wait for 5 minutes and place the chocolate in molds.
Did I misunderstand the recipe's steps?
Hi there, even with the sous vide tempering you need to start out with the temp at 125°f, you want to make sure to temp the chocolates internal temperature to make sure it actually gets to 125°f. Then down to the minimum of 82°f. Heat does transfer a little slower with fat compared to water so we do recommend you still take a temp reading of the chocolate its self to make sure it is actually hitting the desired temperatures. I hope that helps!
Hi Kyl, thank you so much for replying so fast, I appreciate it!
If I understand correctly, my mistake for skipping one step, i.e. after melting everything and putting in a bag, I should put this latter in a 125°f water bath then when the chocolate hits this temp, lowering the water bath temp to 82°f with ice etc. Please correct if I'm wrong.
I'll try this tomorrow.
Would a IR thermometer allow to check for the temp when the chocolate is inside the sous vide bag?
Ah, I see. Thank you for explaining!
One more question: I have a chamber vacuum - is this a problem as it seems to get warmer in the chamber while pulling a cycle?
I made these yesterday and they turned out great! Super glossy and amazing snap. There were a couple issues I wanted to ask for further improvement. The bars when I flipped them out, most of it was super shiny and there were a couple spots where it was not. Would that be from the chocolate losing temper while I was painting the inside of the mold? The final issue I had was while trying to get the temp of the chocolate to the specified 125 in the first stage of tempering. I used my Joule and set the water bath to 125. Even after two hours it never got passed 121. I checked the water temp and the actual chocolate temp the whole time and massaged the chocolate bag. I gradually upped the water bath and ended at135 in order to get the chocolate to the 125 degrees Fahrenheit. I then dropped the temp of the water bath to 88 using ice and cold water. the let the chocolate sit at that temp for a half hour and took its temp and it was hovering at 83. What would be the reason for me having to raise the water temp?
Hi Matthew, Im glad you got over all good results but let me see if I can help with the few specific issues you raised.
First the uneven shine- this is very common, if you check out any chocolate bar you buy packaged they will mostly be a matte color, its very, very, very difficult to get a consistent result across the entire bar with the level of shine you are looking for. ambient room temp, humidity and the speed it cools down can all effect that. As well as the molds them self. I made hundreds of bars for this activity and can honestly say not one came out to be 100% perfect to what we wanted as a standard, but they were 10x better than any packaged one you can buy.
Second, the temperature in joule. We ran into this as well, and it has to do with how heat transfers in fat compared to water. Fat is much less efficient that water, and with sous vide most of the things we cook in it are mostly comprised of water and have a great heat transfer. We are going to make some amendments to the sous vide tempering page at some point after some more research to reflect that. Matthew and I both feel it is more efficient to just heat the chocolate to 125 in a bowl over a hot water bath and then follow the bowl method from there. Or like you did we found raising the temperature 5°f over our target helped us get there. Now if you have the time to let it sit in the bag over night or for over 5 hours or so it will get there for sure.
Hope that helps out some. Let me know if you have any other questions.
Hi Sherlock, sorry I was out of the office last Friday and didn't see this message until now. Yes I would recommend making sure to get it up to that 125°f in the sous vide bath first then follow the process from there. you can use an IR thermometer but make sure you are doing it into the bag after you give it a good mix.
Hola muchas por esta técnica muy buena me gustaría que no e enseñaran a hacer chocolate blanco y con leches sería genial gracias
I made my first batch of bars and overall I’m happy, but two quick questions:
1. The bar has a little melt to it pretty quickly after holding it. It’s not a lot, but there is some chocolate on the fingers. Is this a tempering error?
2. My bars have a marbled/speckled look to them. It’s kinda neat, but not what we are going for. How did this happen? Thank you!
Todd, if you try this I'd love an update with the result.
Hi Nick, it does appear that your bars are out of temper. That would explain the melting on your fingers. And the speckled bit is the bloom from them being out of temper. The molds look great though!
Thank you!
Wondering what percentage of cocoa does the base recipe make? I know you can adjust everything but just wondering what the standard is. Thanks in advance!
The one place that fell short was the grind size. I have a conche would this help with the grind size? If so what would the steps be to add this to the recipe.
Cheers
Our standard was 64%. Decreasing the sugar will raise the % of the chocolate.
A conche is a sure fire way for minimizing the grind. The only step to add would be placing it into the conche after Step 3. After conching, then proceed with tempering.
Thanks!
One thing that is confusing to me is the silk is created at a much lower temperature than the 125deg and most say not to heat the cocoa butter above the silk temperature. So, how is it we're not ruining it using the stove top method by taking it to 125?
From what I understand, you are using the cocoa butter silk simply for seeding a fresh batch of chocolate that has never been through the tempering process. You would be adding the silk after you have heated your chocolate to the 125°f melt point and are in the first phase of cooling. This helps the beta 5 crystals to start to form. You can essentially do the same exact thing by throwing in a chunk of any tempered chocolate bar as well.
When using the conche, I keep a tab on the temperature of the product, is there a maximum temperature that I should not exceed? At one point I hit 127.6 F, and added a fan to lower the temperature, pointed at the motor that would pass around the bowl.
When using the conche, I keep a tab on the temperature the product, is there a maximum temperature that I should not exceed? At one point I hit 127.6 F, and added a fan to lower the temperature, pointed at the motor that would pass around the bowl.
when can you add flavoring? I have oil based flavors like hot mango or tamarind..
I would add them into the powders, then mix with the cocoa butter.
Is it possible to make a 90-100% cocao bar with this method?
Yes. Just reduce the sugar.
Would the other ingredients have to remain the same amount or increase to make up for the difference?
Same. Only alter the sugar amount.
