Dipping truffles for Christmas orders! Today it’s cinnamon, salted caramel, ginger and bourbon golden raisin truffles in milk chocolate.
melted milk chocolate for truffles
Smells like cinnamon and chocolate in here!
Category Archives: Chocolates
Let the ganache begin!
First things first, ganache is a mix of cream and chocolate. It is the truffle center for all of my truffles. I am going to be making 15 different flavors of ganache this week. I personally do:
1# dark chocolate
1 1/2 cups cream
All you need to do is chop the chocolate into small pieces, no larger then a half inch, then place it in a heat proof bowl. Next scald your cream with a pinch of salt. As soon as the cream boils pour it over your chopped chocolate. Let it sit for 1 minute then whisk until it comes together. Be careful with your whisking. I tend to splash cream all over the counter, which is kind of a waste of deliciousness. Once you have thoroughly combined your chocolate let it sit at room temp for at least 10 minutes then refrigerate until set. I like to make it a day ahead. Now you have made ganache!
Once the ganache has set I like to use a 110 size ( the smallest) ice cream or candy scoop to scoop the truffles into equal portions. Then I roll them into little balls just like you would tollhouse cookie dough before you bake it, except much smaller. After this I either put them back into the fridge, covered, then dip them into tempered chocolate or you could just roll them in cocoa powder and call them done and delicious!
Here it comes….
Dark, milk and white chocolate, 22 pound bags!!
More chocolate.
Today I ordered 242 pounds of chocolate. 242 POUNDS!!!! I will be getting it on Thursday, I will provide photos!! I am going to receive 5, 22# bags of bittersweet chocolate. 5, 22# milk chocolate and 1, 22# bag of white chocolate. I can’t wait to see it all together!!
So Much Chocolate. Oh My!
Tempering chocolate can be a little scary but it is always wonderful. No matter what happens you get to eat chocolate.
The first thing that you need is chocolate, this is my favorite brand. Barry Callebaut
Dark Chocolate. Definitely my favorite chocolate. I love to dip milk chocolate ganache in dark chocolate that way when you bite in it has a outer crunch and a creamy center. Magical. With dark chocolate you can also do very robust flavors such as wine and cayenne. The spicy Cayenne truffle is a family favorite. I made it once and now I don’t think I will ever be allowed to stop. Which is fine because it’s awesome.
Milk Chocolate. Who doesn’t love milk chocolate? I actually know a lot of people that don’t care for it. It has so many possibilities though! Bourbon Golden Raisin would not be possible without milk chocolate. Neither would Earl Grey. Dark chocolate can just be a bit overpowering sometimes.
These are 22kg blocks. 11 pounds of chocolate. I will be in possession of at least 15 blocks this season. That is 165 pounds of chocolate!!!!
I love chocolate!!
Since we are talking about chocolate I guess I should mention the red-headed step child, white chocolate. I am a widely known white chocolate hater. White chocolate is a chocolate derivative. It commonly consists of cocoa butter, sugar, milk solids and salt, and is characterized by a pale yellow or ivory appearance. The melting point of cocoa butter, its primary cacao bean component, is high enough to keep white chocolate solid at room temperature. This definition was provided by Wikipedia. I believe that white chocolate has its place in the baking world, in cookies and…well that’s about it. I am not one of those pastry chefs that doesn’t use ingredients just because they don’t like them so therefore I do put one white chocolate truffle into the candy boxes for Christmas. White Chocolate Brandied Cherry. The dried cherries soaked in brandy really mask the white chocolate flavor. Maniacal Laugh
Chocolates
It’s Chocolates season again! I went a little overboard this year and got some pretty cool stuff. First up is our new chocolate tempering machine…….
This beauty is amazing! I have always wanted one and this year Jesse and I farm-sat for three weeks and used most of the money to buy the ACMC Tabeltop Tempering Machine. A tempering machine makes the life of chocolates so much easier and less messy. Well that’s what it’s supposed to do. I did a test run and everything went pretty well. I have never used one like this before so it took some figuring out. I believe I have now read the manual at least 10 times. The machine can temper up to six pounds of chocolate at a time and it only takes about an hour. I love the idea of this because to temper that much chocolates by hand would take an hour of constant stirring and checking. The machine is very set-it-and-forget-it! In other words…Amazing!!!
Landry's Confections 