Level: Novice

Read Time: 7 minutes

After last week’s in depth conversation about roasting cocoa in a coffee roaster, I wanted to, nay, needed to take it a little easy this week.  There are a bunch of pretty simple questions that don’t really merit a full long winded response but in that there are no stupid questions (that is NOT a challenge folks) I still want to answer them.  It also helps clear a little of the back log. 

I present to you the Dirty Dozen.

 

I am trying to mix a cocoa powder and bakers sugar mixture into a soft serve ice cream using waring mixer. It takes forever to get it homogenized, but after reading your research, I guess that doesn't really happen. Do you have any suggestions for me do to make a faster shake.

 

Good for you for looking up the answer, namely that cocoa powder does not and will not ever dissolve in anything and also that it is gritty in comparison to the particle size in chocolate.  What I do is take a piece of chocolate and pour some amount of boiling water over it and hit it with my immersion blender. If your water ration is much over about 4:1 you won’t have to worry about seizing and it will give you a nice slurry you can then add to your other shake ingredients.  Quite often I add about the same amount of ice cubes to balance the boiling water.

 

 

I’ve pressed out the cocoa butter from some nibs and am trying to grind the powder so I can mix it into a quick chocolate milk but it won’t dissolve.  I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong.

 

What you are doing wrong is not researching.  Cocoa powder will never dissolve in anything that you have around your kitchen.

https://chocolatealchemy.com/blog/2020/7/18/ask-the-alchemist-286

What you can do here is what I suggested above.  Add some boiling water to some actual chocolate and blend that up and add whatever ingredients after that be it more sugar, milk, etc.  What you still might find is that it won’t taste like modern quick hot chocolate because instant hot chocolate is a highly processed product designed to stir and go.  If it was that easy at home, they would not have had to develop the product in the first place.

 

 

I really like the flavor when I make a homemade mocha.  I stir in a piece of chocolate my aeropress coffee but it never comes out quite smooth.  What can I do to make a quick mocho?

 

You need the action of an immersion blender like I mention above.  On my espresso machine I use the steam wand and that action also incorporates the chocolate pretty well.  I’ve tried shaking the hell out it and the results are hit or miss.  My favorite way to make a mocha is to take a little time and make a ganache that is smooth and creamy and then stir that in.  In that it is already an emulsion it works much better.

 

When I make coffee in a French Press, I pour it out into a cup or carafe as soon as it’s done, so it doesn’t get bitter from steeping too long. Does this matter for cacao? I find for tea/herbal tea it varies. If I can leave cacao on the grounds while I drink it, that would just make the process more efficient, with fewer dishes to wash.

 

I find it doesn’t get bitter, but does get astringent.  The same goes for grinding extra fine so you can use less. I personally find it isn’t all about efficiency.  It is about enjoying the product and I find I enjoy it a bit more when I take the time to filter it. I am not a fan of having to strain the cocoa floaters through my teeth.  If 2020 et al has taught us anything, it is maybe to slow down and remember the things we enjoy and why we are doing what we are doing instead of rushing around trying to do the most things in the least amount of time.

 

What is the upper temperature limit of chocolate bars before it goes out of temper?

 

There is no one answer.  This isn’t a good question as different chocolates have different upper ranges.  I can safely say 95 F….but that is hardly a useful answer. What would have been better is to know why you were asking as that affects the answer. Do you want to know storage temperatures? Or what temperature to melt it? The thing is that chocolate can naturally go out of temper at 80 F by a solid state reaction from Type V to Type VI. It takes a long time, sometimes months but it happens almost regardless of temperature and I really don’t know that limit. And if you are right at the average pour up point for the given chocolate (88 F for dark, 86 F for milk) you can go out of temper pretty quickly. And it also depends whether the whole bar melts. A little melt can be ok as the solid chocolate can reseed it and keep the temper…but also if it get really hot (over 95 F) and then cooled, it will almost certainly bloom.

 

What is a couverture chocolate? Can we make it at home with a milanger of course? Also how is it different from the dark chocolate that you have taught us?

 

Couverture is just a higher fat percentage chocolate, specifically with a low viscosity.  There isn’t a set percentage.  The key is to add cocoa butter until your viscosity is low and the melted chocolate is nice and thin.  For a dark chocolate I’d estimate at 40%.  For milk, that could be 50%

 

Another question I stay in India where the temperature in summers rises to around 45 degree centigrade, so the question is how to keep chocolate melting while shipping (inside India)?

 

Insulated packages and ice packs.  Yes, it is expensive.  Yes, you need both.

 

Hi, I have been making Chocolate Tahini Spread using my cocoatown melangerwith the following recipe:
1000 gr. nibs, 800 gr. toasted sesame seeds with 30 gr. cocoabutter and this I let grind for 36 hrs. Then we add the lecithin, and the milk pwdr, (550gr.) mixed with 650 gr. sugar and 1 tsp. salt. This we grind another 24 hrs., then we add 2 cups of canola oil and after about 1 hour we stop the melanger and wait for the temp. to drop to around 33.5 C. and mix in 8 tsps. of silk.  We fill the 9 oz. bottles and everything looks fine, but after a coulple of days small white specks are forming on top as well as in the mix. Could this be some cristalization of the cocoa butter? I am a bit at a loss on this!

 

The pedantic answer is yes.  It is some type of crystallization.  What you have going on is that most likely the canola oil isn’t compatible with the cocoa butter so it is separating.  I don’t have a simple solution for you.  The first direction I would take is to try changing to a different compatible oil. Check this out:

https://chocolatealchemy.com/blog/2015/06/18/ask-the-alchemist-120

 

I want to write a custom control for my Behmor roaster, that allows me to set the rate of temp change within dev and finish, as well as EOR Temp.   I can control room temp, and for the most part humidity. I think I have ideas on how to solve momentum and avoid burning. I also have a plan to manage differences in bean moisture.  Assuming I have the other variables covered, would this be the most desireable way to control roasting? Or should I also be planning for a moving target temp for the start of the finishing phase?

 

Oh my, this is one of those questions that might look simple on the surface but just isn’t.  On thing the I have to say that caught my attention and makes me think you might not really have a grasp on this is you mention humidity and have it in control.  My concern is that humidity needs no control or consideration at all in roasting and if you think it does you are not understanding something.  That all said, and taking this as written, the Behmor is not well suited for control.  If you are going to have anything resembling a chance you are going to need to drill out the drum and get a temperature probe in there.  It is literally impossible to extrapolate ANY chamber temperature to actual bean temperature.  That all said, you should control the ramp rates and not change the target temperatures.  Check these out:

 
 
 

 

In one of your videos on creating cocoa butter seed from seed, you mentioned that cocoa butter that had been created at home using a press could be used but would need to be clarified first.
Can you explain what you mean by clarified. I thought it was simply straining it through some kind of filter, to get rid of some the darker cocoa mass content, but I just wanted to be sure.

 

Yes, it is just straining it so it is clear (not colorless) and yellow, not brown with particulates.

 

What is the relationship between cocoa bean nibs and using raw cocoa powder? Is 24oz of nibs the same as 24oz of powder?

 

First off, you should not be using raw cocoa powder for anything.  I’m heavily opinionated about that.  Next, the relationship between cocoa nibs and cocoa powder is that the later is the result of pressing the former and removing most of the cocoa butter and then grinding it. And also, no, currently there is no way to grind and make your own cocoa powder at home. It takes a rather expensive industrial hammer mill.

So no, 24 oz of nibs is not the same as 24 oz of powder.  Nibs have about 50% cocoa butter and powder is 10-20% butter.

 

Hi, I am wanting to purchase a tempering and pour machine. A small personal use one. Do you have any recommendations? I have a santha grinder and one about that size for tempering would be great. But whatever you think would be best. I have tried to temper by hand over and over and just can't get it to work, so I would like to just pour into a machine and have it do the work for me.

 

A very common comment from our instagram about tempering with silk.

This might sound harsh.  My recommendation is that you learn to temper.  You still need that knowledge to reliably run a tempering machine. I’ve seen it time and again.  Person has trouble tempering, gives up, buys magic tempering machine and has trouble tempering because they are still missing the basics and 75% of the time it has nothing to do with actually tempering but instead it is cooling and pouring up. Those problems won’t go away with a tempering machine.  As far as a real recommendation, use silk.

https://chocolatealchemy.myshopify.com/collections/raw-ingredients/products/cocoa-butter-silk

 
 

Have a Question for The Alchemist?

2 Comments