ice cream bar mold image
clj02
I want to make fancy dipped fruit where the chocolate actually hardens on the fruit. No crappy chocolate like Magic Shell. Please show me a website for gourmet hardening chocolate...good quality chocolate.
Thanks!
Answer
Magic Shell only works on things that are cold like ice cream anyway, so even if you froze some fruit and put Magic Shell on, it would melt as the fruit thawed.
There is chocolate sold for home chocolate "crafts" at many craft-supply stores. It looks sort of like giant flattened chocolate chips and comes in different flavors (milk chocolate, dark chocolate, mint, peanut butter etc.) and often in lots of different colors of "white" chocolate so people can pour the melted colors into molds and make a pink flower with a green leaf and stem, etc.
The good news is, you don't need that stuff! It's expensive and a pain to find and not the best-tasting chocolate either. Here is a website so you can see the stuff I'm talking about: http://buychocolatemolds.com/realchocolate.htm As you'll notice $10/lb seems to be their cheapest chocolate and that doesn't include shipping of course.
Any chocolate that's hard when you buy it at room temperature can be melted and then will turn back hard (solid) once it cools! So you can probably use whatever "gourmet" brand is your favorite, so long as it's a pure chocolate bar and doesn't have nuts or a filling in it.
The trick is in getting the chocolate to melt without separating or burning. Some brands/varieties you can actually melt in the microwave, in a microwave-safe bowl or mug (a mug has a handle for safe handling) so long as you only microwave it for 20 seconds or so at a time in between checking and maybe stirring it.
Traditionally -- before microwaves -- chocolate was melted using the "double boiler" or "bain marie" (that's French for double boiler) method. You heat plain water in a pan on the stove, then put either a bowl or another pan on top of the first pan so that the chocolate is heated indirectly and melts slowly.
Once you have your melted chocolate, just dip whatever fruits you like in it. It will take time for the chocolate to harden! You can either just lay the dipped fruit on waxed paper, or carefully prop each piece chocolate-side-up on a baking rack or something like an empty egg carton if you don't want one side of the chocolate coating to get flattened.
You can do multi-layered dips if you want -- dark and white or milk and dark or even three layers. You'll have to experiment to see whether letting the first layer harden before dipping the next works better for you, or whether you want to do the second dip before letting the first harden, as there are proponents of both methods.
Here's a video of one of Food Network's chefs demonstrating the double-boiler method and making it look easy: http://www.hulu.com/watch/48781/food-network-originals-melting-chocolate
As you can see she also gets around the "what do I do with this thing covered in hot melted chocolate now?" problem by rolling her goodies in sprinkles. You could use fancier sprinkles, or something like chopped nuts or shredded coconut, if you wanted to do that.
Here's a similar video on YouTube if you can't use the first site: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKCWgoRoyck
My favorite brands of chocolate, for eating and cooking, that come in a "plain" variety without filling or anything else in it, are Droste, Ghirardelli, Lindt and Perugina. You could also use something like Dove or Newman's Own, or another organic brand like Green & Black, especially if you're using organic fruit. Just remember it should be just chocolate in the bar (or chips, or bite-sized pieces). You can use as dark or as milky a chocolate as you want, and most of those brands do sell white chocolate also in case you want to use that.
Finally, here's a video of a gutsy woman melting chocolate for dipping fruit on the stove without using a double boiler. Confession time: I have used this method myself (the non-stick pan is key) but don't anymore because... sometimes it works and sometimes you just ruin your chocolate. Which is why I don't recommend it.
(PS Don't let Culinary Skeptic scare you. You don't have to temper chocolate for what you want to do, so long as you use the right kind of chocolate and a slow-heating method, either a double boiler or the microwave method. Thousands of people with no culinary training do it every day. I did leave out two important points about the double-boiler method though, which other posters mentioned: don't let the simmering water touch the bottom of the bowl the chocolate is in, and don't let any water get in the chocolate as it's melting or as you're working with it. This means to be careful of escaping steam from the bottom of the double boiler, and also to make sure your fruit has been blotted dry before dipping.)
Sites where you can order Droste, Ghirardelli, Lindt and Perugina:
http://www.bluedelft.com/drostepastilles.html
http://shop.ghirardelli.com/
http://www.lindtusa.com/category-exec/category_id/21/landing/1/nm/Bars
http://usachocolate.com/perugina-chocolate-bars-c-8.html
Magic Shell only works on things that are cold like ice cream anyway, so even if you froze some fruit and put Magic Shell on, it would melt as the fruit thawed.
There is chocolate sold for home chocolate "crafts" at many craft-supply stores. It looks sort of like giant flattened chocolate chips and comes in different flavors (milk chocolate, dark chocolate, mint, peanut butter etc.) and often in lots of different colors of "white" chocolate so people can pour the melted colors into molds and make a pink flower with a green leaf and stem, etc.
The good news is, you don't need that stuff! It's expensive and a pain to find and not the best-tasting chocolate either. Here is a website so you can see the stuff I'm talking about: http://buychocolatemolds.com/realchocolate.htm As you'll notice $10/lb seems to be their cheapest chocolate and that doesn't include shipping of course.
Any chocolate that's hard when you buy it at room temperature can be melted and then will turn back hard (solid) once it cools! So you can probably use whatever "gourmet" brand is your favorite, so long as it's a pure chocolate bar and doesn't have nuts or a filling in it.
The trick is in getting the chocolate to melt without separating or burning. Some brands/varieties you can actually melt in the microwave, in a microwave-safe bowl or mug (a mug has a handle for safe handling) so long as you only microwave it for 20 seconds or so at a time in between checking and maybe stirring it.
Traditionally -- before microwaves -- chocolate was melted using the "double boiler" or "bain marie" (that's French for double boiler) method. You heat plain water in a pan on the stove, then put either a bowl or another pan on top of the first pan so that the chocolate is heated indirectly and melts slowly.
Once you have your melted chocolate, just dip whatever fruits you like in it. It will take time for the chocolate to harden! You can either just lay the dipped fruit on waxed paper, or carefully prop each piece chocolate-side-up on a baking rack or something like an empty egg carton if you don't want one side of the chocolate coating to get flattened.
You can do multi-layered dips if you want -- dark and white or milk and dark or even three layers. You'll have to experiment to see whether letting the first layer harden before dipping the next works better for you, or whether you want to do the second dip before letting the first harden, as there are proponents of both methods.
Here's a video of one of Food Network's chefs demonstrating the double-boiler method and making it look easy: http://www.hulu.com/watch/48781/food-network-originals-melting-chocolate
As you can see she also gets around the "what do I do with this thing covered in hot melted chocolate now?" problem by rolling her goodies in sprinkles. You could use fancier sprinkles, or something like chopped nuts or shredded coconut, if you wanted to do that.
Here's a similar video on YouTube if you can't use the first site: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKCWgoRoyck
My favorite brands of chocolate, for eating and cooking, that come in a "plain" variety without filling or anything else in it, are Droste, Ghirardelli, Lindt and Perugina. You could also use something like Dove or Newman's Own, or another organic brand like Green & Black, especially if you're using organic fruit. Just remember it should be just chocolate in the bar (or chips, or bite-sized pieces). You can use as dark or as milky a chocolate as you want, and most of those brands do sell white chocolate also in case you want to use that.
Finally, here's a video of a gutsy woman melting chocolate for dipping fruit on the stove without using a double boiler. Confession time: I have used this method myself (the non-stick pan is key) but don't anymore because... sometimes it works and sometimes you just ruin your chocolate. Which is why I don't recommend it.
(PS Don't let Culinary Skeptic scare you. You don't have to temper chocolate for what you want to do, so long as you use the right kind of chocolate and a slow-heating method, either a double boiler or the microwave method. Thousands of people with no culinary training do it every day. I did leave out two important points about the double-boiler method though, which other posters mentioned: don't let the simmering water touch the bottom of the bowl the chocolate is in, and don't let any water get in the chocolate as it's melting or as you're working with it. This means to be careful of escaping steam from the bottom of the double boiler, and also to make sure your fruit has been blotted dry before dipping.)
Sites where you can order Droste, Ghirardelli, Lindt and Perugina:
http://www.bluedelft.com/drostepastilles.html
http://shop.ghirardelli.com/
http://www.lindtusa.com/category-exec/category_id/21/landing/1/nm/Bars
http://usachocolate.com/perugina-chocolate-bars-c-8.html
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