One of the most important steps in the art of “chocolate making” is the so-called tempering or pre-crystallization of the chocolate.
In the liquid state and at a temperature above 35° Celsius, crystals have not yet been formed in the chocolate, the fat content is liquid. If the chocolate is left to cool down normally, the fat content of the cacao butter will create various different crystal forms and the chocolate may develop bad characteristics such as grayish-white fat bloom and a fragile structure.
When the chocolate is tempered, it is pre-crystallized and only the good and correct crystal form is retained. You can recognize a high quality and correctly tempered chocolate based on the following characteristics:
- beautiful surface gloss
- clear, firm break
- slowly melting
In order to keep only the good crystal form, the liquid chocolate is cooled so that all the forms, good and bad, are developed. Now, in order to remove the bad crystals and keep the good ones, the chocolate mass is slowly reheated. The good thing is that the bad crystal forms already melt at a lower processing temperature, and thus the good crystals remain when heated. However, the temperature difference is very small and if the mass is reheated to over 35 °C, even the good crystals will melt away. Tempering is a complex process that requires a lot of accuracy and concentration. There are several ways to temper chocolate.
At laflor, we first cool the chocolate and then reheat it, as explained above. Another way is tempering by hand. In this process, the liquid chocolate is poured onto a cool marble slab and constantly moved with a spatula in order to cool it down evenly. You can find a great explanatory video on the subject of glazing made by our friends at Felchlin Switzerland here.