Let's talk chocolate

With the cloth and the sandpaper beams shipping out today, weaving is pretty much out for the next week.  So let’s talk chocolate.

I have brainstormed a list of 35-odd flavors that I want to try, some in multiple variations.

Clearly, doing these one at a time is going to take forever.  But let’s not despair.  With the exception of the brandied cherry cordials, all these are truffle centers.  One makes truffle centers as a three-step process:

1. Steep flavorings in hot cream.
2. Add boiling, flavored cream to chocolate and stir.
3. Add flavorants and liqueurs.

So I categorized the flavorants as steeped flavorings or added flavorings, and came up with this matrix:

(Yes, I have four kinds of dark chocolate.  Actually I think I have seven – representing almost all of the Valrhona offerings – and each is subtly different.  But I think I will only use about 4 in centers.)

This is still pretty complicated, as one could get about a thousand different flavor combinations just from these ingredients. But it makes the process much quicker:

1. Boil 9 different batches of cream, one for each steeped flavor.
2. Mix the steeped flavors together as appropriate for each flavor mix.
3. Pour over the appointed chocolate + butter.  Stir.
4. Add flavorants as appropriate.

This should let me get all the flavor combinations I want in a relatively simple matrix.  I may simplify things somewhat by just using my “standard” chocolate (Valrhona Extra Bitter, or sometimes Pur Caraibe) for most of the dark chocolate centers and switching out to a more refined selection at production time.

Beyond that, I also want to experiment with formulations of truffle centers.  Basically, to make truffle centers you add chocolate (cocoa, sugar, cocoa butter), cream, butter, and sometimes a little invert sugar (preservative and texturizing agent).  I don’t use invert sugar for the simple reason that it comes in 22-lb tubs.  That wouldn’t necessarily stop me, but I also don’t feel that sugar adds much to the flavor, so I typically substitute cream for the sugar.  Shortens the shelf life, but I tell everyone to eat them within 10 days anyway, so…

Anyway, the firmness of your truffle center is largely a function of proportions of liquid to cocoa butter in the finished product.  I have a formulation from Frederic Bau’s Au Coeur des Saveurs that is perfect for chocolates to be dipped, but this is typically firmer than you’d want for a truffle center in a molded chocolate.  I monkeyed with the formula last year and got a result that I mostly liked, but I want to try some more scientific experiments this year.  So I will mess with that a little bit, too.

All of which sounds like a lot of work, but if you want to learn, you have to study.  And I’ve wanted to do this sort of systematic study for YEARS.