Daily musings and writings from the Alchemist
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Products
As promised, the new Escali Scale is now available. It has a 33 lb capacity and is what I have been using for quite some time. I have also swapped out a couple of the molds. The Bar mold is more of a classic look now - 4 oz and you get three per mold. And the truffle mold is now a little less expensive and I like the shape better.
Please, go have a look.
Oh, and this is not something I am offering, but something I found and wanted to share.
Well, there are a number of things that I am excited about this year. Here are some of the things you can look forward to hearing about:
I am sure there is more. I will continually be experimenting with different cocoa beans, techniques, recipes, etc and passing that information on to you.
As always, please email me if you have questions, concerns, problems or praise. I love to hear from everyone. And don't forget about the E-mail list we offer. It is not a really busy list, but there are some really good and knowledgeable people there.
Happy new year everyone and thanks for making 2005 a great year.
Your humble servant,
Alchemist John
Actually, it is not quite available but you can order one. The shipment is still clearing customs, but we expect the new vent modified Santhas to be shipping next week. Sorry, no 99 hour timers made it in this shipment. A number of you have been asking if they will be available by Christmas. It is going to be close. In an effort for some of them to make it by Christmas, I am going to go ahead and accept orders for them. That way, the paperwork, payment etc is all taken care of and we can get them right out to you. Also, there are a select number available in a sharp new maroon color. Again, let me know if you want one of these. Also, the deadline for UPS and USPS to guarantee delivery has come and gone (it was 12-12-5). If you want something by Christmas, and absolutely, positively have to have it, you may wish to consider 3 day select from UPS (tell in a note when you order) to make sure it gets there. I will make every effort to get the orders out quickly. I would not recommend that shipping method for the Santhas - they are 50# and the cost would be high.
Here's wishing you a happy holidays, good food, good friends and great chocolate.
With the holidays officially on us, I have been getting a few requests for "gift" items. I have done some thinking, asking people here and there, and have come up with a few items I think would make nice gifts (either for yourself or someone else) - especially for the person who "has everything" - I can virtually guarantee they don't have chocolate making kits. So here is what is now available - there are no listings in the Products page yet, but they are in the drop down menus (check the very end) of the Orders section. 72% Dark Chocolate Kit - makes 2.5 lbs - $48.00
You don't need to know much about chocolate making to use this kit. It contains all the ingredients, in the exact amounts you need, to make 2.5 lbs of fresh, home made chocolate. It includes lightly roasted Jamaican cocoa nibs, cocoa butter, sugar and lecithin to make a silky, lush dark chocolate. All that is required is to run the cocoa though your Champion Juicer (another gift?) and refine it in the Santha Wet Grinder. The Champion and Santha are not included. Neither are molds, so pick some out to go with the kit if you need them. - Note: If you have soy allergies, the lecithin may be omitted.
44% Milk Chocolate Kit - makes 4.0 lbs - $42.00
For those who love milk chocolate, this kit all the ingredients, in the exact amounts you need, to make 4.0 lbs of fresh, home made milk chocolate. It includes fully roasted Ghanan cocoa nibs, cocoa butter, dry milk powder, sugar and lecithin. This makes a full flavored, heady milk chocolate. All that is required is to run the cocoa though your Champion Juicer (another gift?) and refine it in the Santha Wet Grinder. The Champion and Santha are not included. Neither are molds, so pick some out to go with the kit if you need them. - Note: If you have soy allergies, the lecithin may be omitted. Likewise, I am trying to find an alternative to the milk powder for those with milk allergies.
As noted says above, you need both a Champion Juicer and Santha Wet Grinder to make full use of the above kits, but you won't have to worry about learning to roast, what recipe to use or anything like that. Complete directions are also included.
For those who want to experiment a little, we are now offering a 2 lb sampler pack. It is similar to the regular Sampler pack, but with a half pound of each of our four types of cocoa beans instead of 4 oz. The Larger Sampler pack is $32.00.
Finally, we are now offering Gift Certificates. They can be for any amount over $10.00 and do not expire during the life of the business. Nice for the person who wants to experiment but you don't know what to choose for them.
Happy chocolate making!
The new continuous use, factory modified Santhas should be in around the end of the month. There will not be any with 99 hour timers. That will be next time. I have been doing a little cleaning and updating of the site. The Tempering section has been updated with pictures and I have added a couple new chocolate recipes. In particular I have added a White chocolate and adjusted some of the current directions to include refining by the Santha.
Oh, and just because I said I would post it, aside from mouth feel, here is how I determine when the chocolate should come out of the refiner. It's viscosity starts to change and it (no offense here, men have them too) nipples up.
These three samples are one hour apart, the final one being at 12 hours. I refined it for another 3 hours after that.
I have been experimenting with the Jamaican Cocoa beans. I finally got a good shot of the beans that show off that polish of theirs.
And while we are at it, here is 7-8 lbs of the Jamaican 72% chocolate in the Santha (note the hot new color available) before and after the addition of my sugar. I will post a final picture of chocolate after refining and some photos showing how the texture changes hour by hour.
And then finally, just a little experiment to show that you can not just add "a tiny" amount of water to dissolve sugar. I hate to give absolutes, but I think I just might be safe on this one - with a qualifier or two.
You can not add ANY water to chocolate and have it flow and behave like "normal" chocolate.
By way of a customer's comment (thank you John H.) I tried cracking some cocoa beans with my Champion Juicer. I had thought of this some time ago, but never pursued it because the Crankandstein Cocoa mill works so well. I just ran the whole cocoa beans through the juicer without the lower plate on. It cracks them with a single pass and shoots them out the bottom. It works with both raw and roasted beans. When I first tried this, I was a little worried about how well it works and whether I had just made the Crankandstein obsolete. Well, after a number of pounds of beans, both raw and roasted, I have the following observations:
And likewise, this leads me to a couple of conclusions.
Basically, it is up to you and what your needs are. I found the husk pieces were smaller with the Champion and so winnowing was a little easier, but as I said, there was more dust (husk and nib) that needs to be removed (I shook my nibs in a fine mesh colander for this test) so that takes a little more time. Either way, we have a new tool in out Alchemy arsenal, or more like, a new use for an existing tool.
Please try it out and report back. I am especially interested in those of you who have both a Champion and Crankandstein Cocoa mill.
The good news is that the new crop of Ocumare Criollo from Venezuela will be in around the end of the week, and I have begun accepting orders. The bad news is that it has lost its certified organic certificate. Now, that is not as bad as it sounds. They did not lose it per se, as much as they decided not to obtain it for financial reasons. In order to be certified organic, the farmers have to be inspected and certified in addition to the co-op needs to be certified. For financial reasons the co-op decided to forego inspection until the next go around at the end of the year. So, it is like this. This crop of Ocumare is from farmers who were certified organic, and plan to be certified organic again, meaning they can't be doing anything right now that is not organic. Likewise, this shipment is coming direct from Venezuela and so will avoid the port fumigation. So I leave it to you to judge how "organic" these cacao beans are. They do not have their certification, paper trail, etc and that is important. But they are the same beans, grown by the same people using the same techniques as they did before. And that is important too. So, if you want so, go ahead and order and I will ship out your order as soon as they arrive. Aside from that, a new crop of Ghana has arrived and I like it a little better than the previous crop. A little more complexity of flavor. Some hints of vanilla and cardamom to compliment that deep chocolate base flavor.
Happy chocolate making everyone.
BTW, Santha update. I will be offering modified motor covers that will allow continuous use of the Santha for refining. Look for those in a week or so. In addition, I have been working with Santha and they have decided to supply me with pre-modified Santhas sometime in November. I will let you know when those become available.
The ordering system will be off-line for a few hours today for maintenance. If you find the system gives you an error, or a "page not found", please try back later. And just to give you a few things that have been happening here, we just received our order of various molds. There are hearts, truffles, bar molds and some really beautiful half egg shapes that are great to use for making filled chocolates. I am taking the photos of all that now, and should have them up and available in a few days.
Also, arriving any day, I should have a Sharp Wet grinder to start testing, modifying and evaluating. Sharp is interested in making the air flow modification at the factory, depending on my work and reviews.
As purchased, the Santha Wet Grinder can not be run more than an hour at a time. For refining chocolate, this is a hassle. I have been doing some tests to determine why it over heated and what I could do about it. It turns out that the motor was simply not getting enough air flow. I cut a hole in the top of motor housing, and added some extra vent holes at the bottom, and now it does not over heat. So far I have run it 24 hours straight, 3 days in a row, with no problems.
Mine now looks like this.
You can see how I did the full modification Here
I think it is easy enough that anyone can do it with basic tools, but I am thinking about offering the Santha-Hack service if there is interest. Is there?
Happy chocolate refining.
We are now offering Champion Juicer and the Santha Wet Grinder. The Champion takes your roasted cocoa beans and liquifies them into cocoa liqueur. Then the Santha works as a refiner and conch, reducing the cocoa and sugar particle size in your chocolate and smooths out the flavor profile. We have also added fine Whole vanilla beans. The are from Madagascar and are of the Bourbon variety. They add a nice depth of flavor to your chocolate creations.
Finally, we have decided on some molds and should have those in within a month or so.
The new Apprentice and Alchemist Kits are now available. Please allow some extra processing and delivery time. I roast and prepare them as ordered, and only roast once a week. That way the beans are fresh. Something kind of interesting has come up. I am getting requests for cocoa bean husks. Well, I have a few that I save from producing nibs, but in general, just don't have a lot of them. If you (who are buying beans) want to save your husks, I might have an outlet for you. They seem to be going into body scrub products. Let me know if you have some or want some and I will try to hook people up. Right now, I have none to sell.
Finally, as some of you may recall, I personally had a house fire about 10 months ago, so Chocolate Alchemy got displaced and turned into our living space. Well, I am just thrilled to report, we are back in our house ( a geodesic dome), and Chocolate Alchemy is back where it belongs. It is so good to have the laboratory back.
As promised, the Products page is all updated. We have added a Sampler pack and the Novice kit. The Apprentice kit and Alchemist Kit will be available in about a week or so. Since the Novice and Apprentice kit both contain roasted beans, please allow a week or so processing time for getting it prepared. This is especially important if you are thinking about one of these for a holiday gift.
Just a few updates. We are getting very low on the Ghanan Forastero and the new Certified Organic Madagascar. If you want to try either, I would recommend doing it soon. I expect we will be out by the Holidays. We are now offering a Sampler pack. It will consist of one quarter pound of five different cocoa beans. This way you can try them out in a couple of recipes and decide which you like the best. The price is $20.00 plus shipping. We do not have the Products page updated yet with them or the next product(s).
Kits: We have been having a lot of requests for both introduction kits and roasted cocoa nibs. Well, for the time being I am going to combine the two. The "Novice" kit will consist of 2 lbs of roasted nibs of my choice (although I will take requests, but can't guarantee I can fulfill them), 8 oz of certified organic cocoa butter (in convenient half ounces cubes), 1 oz of lecithin, and 2-3 chocolate molds (designs again left in the hands of fate), and some basic directions and recipes. If you have a Champion Juicer, this kit will set you up on the road to a few pounds of home made chocolate. The price will be about $30.00 but more on that once the new Kits page is written and finalized. Just after Thanksgiving in all likelihood.
The "Apprentice Kit" will contain roasted and unroasted cocoa beans, so you can start getting a feel for roasting. It will also have cocoa butter and more chocolate molds.
The "Alchemist kit" will not contain anything really special or different that you could not just purchase individually, but will have a price break when you include a Crankandstein Cocoa mill. Basically a nice kit if you just want to jump in with both feet.
Let me know if you think of a variation in kits that you don't see. I am always open to suggestions.
As requested by a few people, these will be available for the Holidays and should make nice gifts.
