October 29th 2008 Posted at General
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Wednesday, october 29th 2008
Lucky there are vacations. This means also that there is no chocolate news today.
I will be back next week with more thrilling chocolate news.
Cheers
Q
October 23rd 2008 Posted at Double layer, General
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Wednesday, october 22nd 2008
Today I visited a chocolatier. He processes 12 tons (24000 pounds) of chocolate per year alone. Huge amount for a shop that he runs alone. It’s amazing how he manages all this chocolate on his own. It needs organisation, courage and a lot of time and last but not least you have to be chocolate freak !
Last week I made chocolates with different layers with my collegue students. Today we enrobed this preparation with dark and milkchocolate. The enrobing is done by a machine filled with tempered chocolate. You have to drop your cutted pralines on it and they are enrobed with chocolate, then passed under a blower which clears the thick layer of chocolate an then trembled, next the praline goes into a cooling tunnel colling down the praline from 16 Celsius to 12C in 5 minutes and at the end you have enrobed and finished pralines. I was not allowed to take pictures unfortunately ;0).
Enrobing machine with cooling tunnel
See the results for yourself.
One layer of lubeca ganache, a layer of vanille cream covered with milkchocolate
One layer of pralinee with marzipan on top with rum covered with dark chocolate
A layer of dark pralinee, marzipan on top and finished with dark chocolate
A layer of white chocolate cream with vanille, marzipan on top, covered with milk chocolate and bresilienne
A layer of pralinee with hard nougat, marzipan on top, covered with milkchocolate and a heart
Personally I think that the pralines that go through an enrobing machine are not as beautifull as manual enrobing. But we eat them for the taste, thats why we all like them.
Enjoy the rest of the week
Alain
October 20th 2008 Posted at Chocolate, Fruit
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Finally some technician managed to get my internet connection up and running !!! Thanks a bunch !!
Last wednesday I did a lot of preparations for next wednesday. I have a few examples of what has been made but not that much. There will be more this week.
First of all this weeks lessons were about composed pralines. Pralines that are made in different layes and tastes. For example : a dark layer of pralinee filling and a marzipan layer, a marzipan layer with a fruit layer, … The possibilities are enourmous.
I also worked with gelatine and pectine to make soft fruit pralines with sugar. Check the example.
A praline with a raspberry layer of 4 millimeter and a layer of praliné on top of it covered with dark origine chocolate.
This is a raspberry fruit bonbon, very soft and covered with sugar.
Next wednesday I go to a chocolate factory to learn to know the different machines used for making chocolates. Although that I already use different machinery to make them, the goal that I want to achieve is handcrafted chocolates with a high quality standard.
See you on wednesday.
Alain
October 17th 2008 Posted at General
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Due to my move to another city and due to the fact that I do not have internet there I cannot post the new creations. I will let you know on monday what has been made.
Meanwhile, Enjoy the weekend !!
Alain
October 9th 2008 Posted at Chocolate, Ganache
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Wednesday, october 8th 2008
Ganache is made from chocolate and cream. It has been invented in the 19th century by accident. An apprentice chocolatier spilled cream in the chocolate he was melting and the chef called him “Ganache”, which means “fool”. The result was delicious and the name was born.
So yesterday there were 8 or 9 different pralines created. They all have different characteristiques and flavours and they are all based on cream, different chocolate and different tastes. Except one praline that was an experiment conducted with my teacher. You can read more after the pictures of the ganache pralines.
Munthé : Cream, fresh mint and white chocolate covered with milkchocolate. If you take a look at the second picture you can see the little green points of the fresh chopped mint leaves.
Banéro : Cream, bananataste, pisang and white chocolate finished with spritsed chocolate (milk and dark chocolate)
Twinty : Cream, cointreau and dark chocolate finished with sugar on top
Brazil : Cream, bresillienne and milk chocolate finished with dark chocolate and bresillienne nuts
Salba : Cream, crusted caramellised almonds and milkchocolate, finished with hazelnuts and milkchocolate
Pastio : Cream, Pastis and dark chocolate, finished with a P from Pastis
Walhalla : Cream, honey, cinnamon and dark chocolate, finished with a W from walhalla
Anola : Cream, pineapple taste, pieces of pineapple on Marasquin with dark chocolate. Finished with milkchocolate.
Maison praline : secret of the house
With my teacher, I also did an experiment. I used a delicious West Vleteren trappist beer 12 to make a ganache. The result is a praline with a creamy dark chocolate taste and a full body beer taste afterwards. I gave it the name : The Sixtus. This praline tastes so good that there will be more pralines in the future with different beers.
The Sixtus : a ganache made with West Vleteren 12
Next week I will present combined pralines. This means that there are different ingredients in the pralines. For example : marzipan with praliné, ganache with caramel and crème au beurre, … Come back at any time on this site so you can enjoy my creations.
Have a good weeken and dream of The Sixtus praline !!
Alain
October 2nd 2008 Posted at Chocolate, Cream
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Wednesday, october 1st 2008
The first of october and I am advancing with my chocolate lessons. The ingredients get much better, the techniques to create them are more difficult and take more work but the result is that the chocolates do look better and they taste even better than I thought.
This weeks pralines are all about cream, alcohol and expensive. There is a lot of work on this type of cream pralines what makes them expensive. The commercial idea is to replace the “petits four” by a praline which is a bit smaller but is at least as tasty.
I have 9 different pralines to present. I hope you like them.
Advocat : Milkchocolate filled with advocat and on top white and dark chocolate
Mokka : Dark chocolate filled with mokka cream and finished with coffeebean print
Passoa : Dark chocolate with cream made of Passoa and white chocolate
Cognac – Coffee : Milk chocolate filled with mokka – Cognac cream finished with a white coffeebean
Raspberry : Dark chocolate with raspberry cream filling, finished with chocolate shavings
Butterfly : Dark chocolate with roasted walnut cream finished with butterfly wings
Pralinee : One with dark chocolate and one with milkchocolate, filled with a caramelised hazelnut on the bottom, pralinee base mass and finished with a sugared walnut on top
Apricot : White chocolate filled with apricot pieces on the bottom (on this picture its caramelised apple pieces), cream with apricot brandy and finished with a white piece of prepared chocolate.
The only disadvantage of this praline is that you cannot keep them long time because the ingredients used are fresh and cannot be stored long time. Well, this way you have a reason to eat them quickly. I am sure that they won’t last 2 weeks.
Enjoy the rest of the week dreaming about chocolate. Next weeksome special about Ganache pralines.
Cheerz Q.