I saw this method of tempering chocolate on the food network, from Alton Brown - that man is pure genius – and wanted to try it out
Whenever I want to coat things/ dip things into chocolate (more than just a drizzle), then I’m always faced with the idea of having to temper the chocolate.
Normally, I wouldn’t really care if there was a little bloom on the chocolate, but when you’re a food blogger, you feel the pressures: you can’t have grainy, bloomed chocolate all over those cookie right!? Does anybody else feel judged for having un-tempered chocolate? nope? just me? Alrighty then.
Anywho, I tried this method out for an upcoming recipe, and thought I’d create a step by step guide with pictures (no .gifs this time – seeing a food processor blending through the tiny chute in the lid isn’t the most informative thing , as I discovered while making this post…). It worked quite well – it wasn’t as annoying as having to heat chocolate to different temperatures and cool it and keep checking the temperature and crying in the corner when you find all your effort was wasted; and it worked pretty well -
I had a butter knife with some of the tempered chocolate on it, sitting on the counter and my friend wanted to - what else – eat the chocolate off the knife. She picked it up and when she tried to lick the chocolate (which she thought was still melted because it was SO DANG SHINY), I just heard her say:
“Woah, mindfuck, it looks like it’s still melted, but it seriously isn’t”
Yup, that’s how I judge how well this worked. Such is my life.
Update: I’ve posted the recipe where I used this method of tempering the chocolate - it’s so shiny! :O
Creds to Alton Brown for this method – (I tweaked it a little)
You will be needing:
- at least 7 oz of chopped chocolate, or chocolate chips or chocolate chunks – semi-sweet / bittersweet works best ( I used half semisweet chocolate chips and half 70% chopped chocolate)
- a food processor
- a thermometer (you only need to use it once)
Put the chocolate into the food processor Blend until you get a mixture that resembles fine bread crumbs.
Scrape down the sides and bottom of the food processor (I utilized a spatula for the sides, and the end of a spoon for the bottom)
Scrape down the sides and bottom of the food processor.
Blend until the chocolate clumps up into a ball – break it up using your hands.
Blend again until you get a thick, ganache like texture. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the food processor.
(ooh so swirly)
Blend until you get smooth, fluid chocolatey goodness. Test the temperature – you want it to be at 90 degrees F – if it isn’t then:
Warm a glass / ceramic heatproof bowl by pouring boiling water into it and leaving for 5 minutes. Pour out the water, dry the bowl well and pour the chocolate from the food processor into the warmed bowl. Stir the chocolate.
Boom. Done.
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{ 21 comments… read them below or add one }
This changes everything. Pure genius.
God, I know right? I don’t know how I’d never seen this before!
NFW. How have I not seen that Good Eats episode? How have I never heard of this before? (Ahhh!!)
I’ve gotten fairly good at tempering chocolate the old-fashioned double boiler stirry way, but I invariably wind up with a bowl of chocolate that falls below prime temp before I’ve finished all my dippings. And while I’ve managed to sort of romanticize the process in my head, the thought of making a second batch is just obnoxious. (And my attempts at very slight rewarming never seem to work—I always wind up with cocoa butter bloomage.)
But oh, the possibilities of THIS! So much easier. I can’t wait to try it!
Yes way! Haha, that was my exact reaction too!
I’ve tried the normal method a few times, but it has never worked as well as this did for me!
SO SHINY.
Will definitely have to try this method!!
Dang. I really could have used this a week or two ago…Oh well, from now on, it’s my go-to! Although I’ll have to buy another thermometer because mine won’t go all the way down to 90. blah.
Thanks for this one! I can’t wait to try it!
Really?!? Its that easy… I have to do it for myself.. I cant believe it to be honest…this changes everything!!:))
This is so awesome. I’ll be trying this for sure – thanks for posting!
This is freaking awesome!!
Oh my god! I just pinned this — I will have to try this next time. I always melt my chocolate in the microwave and feel severely judged for my untempered chocolate
. Thanks Izy!
What a great way to temper chocolate I can’t wait to try this! Thanks
This, is, genius. I’ve been hesitant to try tempering chocolate, but this looks foolproof! I can’t wait to top everything with chocolate
This is AWESOME! Thanks for sharing.
I’ve always wondered if I should try tempering chocolate for certain things, but I never actually got around to trying it. Now that I see how shiny it makes your chocolate, though, I feel like I need to test this method asap! But what I’m wondering is, can you re-melt the chocolate or warm it up again if it starts setting too quickly? Or would you have to temper a new batch? And what kind of thermometer do you use to test the temperature? I feel like I’m asking stupid questions, but oh well!
@Alexandra….I was JUST going to ask the same exact questions!! Thank you Izy…you rock!!
Exactly, i could never be bothered before this! I think that if you need to keep it warm, use Altons method of blasting it with a hair dryer, or my method of just putting it into a hot bowl. I used an electronic thermometer cos its the fast way!
haha no they’re not stupid, they’re very valid questions, I’m just too lazy to write in that much detail hahaha 
x
I need to try this… It seems like pure genius. I will report back!
this is legitimately life changing. thanks!
I read a bunch of other instructions on how to temper chocolate and they all say to not use chocolate chips at all because there’s some sort of additive in them that doesn’t allow you them to melt as easily as blocks or chunks of chocolate. Does that apply to your method of tempering? Which form of chocolate would be best?
Well, I tried this without much success. Don’t know where I went wrong. I tried it with 300g of chocolate – half dark and half 70%. I decided to start with about 1/4 of the chocolate and to keep adding small pieces as it was running. First off – pieces of chocolate kept jamming the blades, so it was constant stopping, fixing, adding more chocolate . . . . Got it to the breadcrumb stage, then got it to a ball. Broke it up, and started blending it again. It went back to a ball again. This must have happened at least 3 times until I ended up with 50% still in a ball. I finally gave up and went back to the usual method, but hell it was difficult to get the chocolate out of the food processor as a lot of it had hardened on the sides!
Tempering chocolate is my nemesis, so I really must give this a try. Thanks for the instructions.
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