Let’s talk about tempering chocolate! Tempered chocolate is shiny and crisp and when you snap it it makes a cracking sound. If you have blooms (white on the surface of the chocolate) it has begun to lose its temper but it is not all lost. Making chocolate isn’t difficult in itself but making keto chocolate and then tempering it can take some practice. Last year in the fall I had plenty of time to practice tempering when my body was rejecting vegetables…. The key is to monitor the process. Don’t walk away. Don’t get distracted… this is a job for a day when you can hang out and stir and watch that thermometer. It’s actually a good practice for creating stillness in your soul. Just saying. Standing and staring at a pool of chocolate and… waiting… waiting… is no bad thing.
So! The process is simple and so is the recipe but you will need a couple key things for the recipe: a candy thermometer and plain 100% tempered chocolate chips or shavings from the chocolate bars to re-temper the chocolate.
You will want to set up a double boiler with a pot of water and a pyrex bowl. Make sure water does not touch the bowl and that the bowl is larger than the pot. You don’t want water or steam to get into the chocolate because it will seize it and all will be lost in terms of getting it properly tempered.
I love using an induction burner because it is responsive and I can set the temperatures to low and know I am not going to burn the chocolate.
I use a kitchen scale for weighing out my chocolate and cacao butter.
You will want silicone molds to pour and set your chocolate or unbleached parchment cups for making keto cups but alternatively you can free pour over unbleached parchment paper and even pour over your added ingredients if you want to make a chocolate bark of some kind. I have done this with coconut chips, sprouted pumpkin seeds, cacao nibs, freeze dried berries or unsweetened dried cranberries. We did chocolate covered strawberries for Valentine’s day so in this case once it is at temp you can just dip the strawberries and set them on unbleached parchment paper or a Silpat.
This recipe is for dark chocolate but feel free to play with it and add more cacao butter to make it lighter. Here we go! Have fun!
Tempering Dark Chocolate
Equipment
- Double Boiler
- Candy Thermometer
Ingredients
- 50-100 g of cacao butter
- 200-230 g of 100% cacao baking chocolate I use 2 bars
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 tsp pure monkfruit powder
- Shavings of cacao baking bar or 100% cacao chips for seeding
Instructions
- Set up a double boiler with a pot of water and a pyrex bowl on top.
- Weigh out 50-100 grams of cacao butter depending on how dark or light you like your dark chocolate.
- Turn your stove or induction burner on lowest temp and melt the cacao butter.
- Once cacao butter is liquid, add the cacao baking bars. And melt it down, watching to make sure temperature reaches but does not exceed 115°F.
- Add the vanilla and monk fruit and stir together.
- Take the bowl off the heat and stir occasionally until it lowers to 100°F. At this point add some baking chocolate shavings or cacao baking chips to “seed” the chocolate.
- Let cool to 84°F
- Turn on the heat again and raise the temperature to 89°F, stir and then pour into molds or onto parchment for making bark. If making keto cups, make sure you have frozen and cut out your circles of filling and have them ready to insert because the chocolate tempers FAST.
- Let sit until it sets completely and then it is ready to eat! I have had it take anything from 5 to 40 minutes, depending on what I have combined it with, thickness, etc.
