The food of the gods. The drink of kings. Chunks of mahogany goodness that bring cheer to a child and melt the heart of a woman. A food so universally loved that we even dedicated a day to it! Curl up with a hot cup of cocoa, savour the pleasure of dark chocolate or even unwrap some candy. Go Mexican and have a plate of mole pablano, a chicken dish with a rich, chocolate-tinged sauce. ?Whatever the form, man simply can?t live without it. On World Chocolate Day, we take a moment to dream a little, lick our lips and celebrate our inner chocoholic.
Spoilt for choice
The composition of chocolate completely changes depending on the amount of cocao solids, chocolate liquor and milk solids it has. Here?s a list of different types of chocolate which you must try
Dark Chocolate
Dark Chocolate consists of at least 35% chocolate liquor and it is generally produced by adding fat and sugar to cocoa. Dark chocolate with higher amount of cocoa solids is also used in cooking.
Milk Chocolate
Milk Chocolate has at least 10% chocolate liquor; however, it?s produced from milk in the form of either milk powder or condensed milk. Swiss Confectioner Daniel Peter had first introduced this chocolate in 1870s. Hershey?s Milk Chocolate, which was introduced in 1900, is a popular variant.
Raw Chocolate
Considered to be the purest form of chocolate, this variety has at least 75% cocoa and it is sold mostly in the cocoa rich countries like Ivory Coast, Ghana, Indonesia and Brazil.
White Chocolate
White Chocolate is made by mixing sugar, milk solids and cocoa butter. Unlike most other forms of chocolate, it doesn?t contain cocoa solids.
Sweet Chocolate
Sweet Chocolate is formed with a mixture of at least 15% chocolate liquor, cocoa butter and sugar in varying amounts. It is mostly sold in US and Canada.
A matter of taste
So you?ve eaten a lot of chocolate. But can you judge how good it is? Here are some things you need to look out for if you want that perfect square of chocolate.
Look
The bar of chocolate should be flawless, with no bubbles, cracks or whitish sugar bloom. The colour should be an even shade of shiny deep mah?ogany. A very dark chocolate bar is not necessarily good, as the beans may have been over-roasted.
Feel
Good chocolate should be silky, not sticky. It should start to melt at your touch at room temperature, as good chocolate contains higher amounts of cocoa butter which melts just below human body temperature.
Snap
When you break a piece of chocolate, it should break cleanly with an audible snap. If it is crumbly or splinters, it isn?t good chocolate.
Taste
Good chocolate will melt almost immediately in your mouth, dissolving into a creamy liquid. It shouldn?t taste grainy or waxy. The more smooth the chocolate is, the better it is. If it has a buttery aftertaste and leaves a residue, the cocoa butter has been replaced by vegetable oil, meaning that the chocolate is not very good. The flavour should be intense, without being too sugary.
Read the label
Sook for fair trade and organic label on chocolate bars. Even though it will be more expensive, you?re more likely to get good quality. Any time you buy chocolate, look for the amount of cocoa solids in the bar. High quality dark chocolate should have at least 70% cocoa solids or mass. Good milk chocolate generally contains between 30% and 45% cocoa solids, while high-end white chocolate is usually only made up of around 30% cocoa butter with very little or no cocoa solids.
Process-
Picking the pod
Fully ripe cacao pods are harvested using a machete. The beans, with their surrounding pulp, are removed from the pods, placed in bins and covered with banana leaves and branches to allow microorganisms to begin the fermentation of the material. The process, which takes up to seven days, produces flavour precursors, which result in the familiar chocolate taste.
Drying time
The fermented beans are dried quickly to prevent mold formation. The beans are spread out on mats to dry in the sun for 5-6 days.
At the end of the drying, the beans will have turned browner and the aroma become more pronounced. The dried beans are then transported to chocolate manufacturing factories.
Ruling the roast
The beans are cleaned and roasted at the factory. There are two ways they can be roasted: at high heat for a short time, which produces a strong chocolate flavour but eliminates subtle notes, or at low heat for a long time, which allows more delicate flavours to shine through. The roasted beans are put through a winnowing machine to remove husks, and the roasted beans are now called nibs.
Liquid goodness
The nibs are ground into a thick liquid called chocolate liqueur, which is cocoa solids suspended in cocoa butter. The cocoa liqueur is blended with cocoa butter in varying quantities to make different types of chocolate. Depending on the product, sugar, milk, vanilla and emulsifying agents are added to the mixture.
Smooth as silk
After being mixed, all kinds of chocolate are treated the same way. The mixture is put through a series of heavy rollers which press it till it is refined to dry flakes. Additional cocoa butter and emulsifying agents are added to the flakes and then mixed to make a smooth paste ready for conching.
Kneading time
Conching develops the flavour further by putting the chocolate mixture through a kneading process. The machines have heavy rollers that knead the mixture back and forth for anywhere between a few hours and seven days.
Mind the temper
The mixture is then tempered ? put through a heating, cooling and reheating process. This allows chocolate to be solidified in a way that keeps it glossy and makes for an audible snap when broken.It also ensures that the chocolate will melt smoothly in your mouth.
The tempered mixture is poured into moulds and allowed to cool.Once the chocolate is demoulded, it is packaged and ready to be sold.
Category: Food & Drink, Life & Style
Source: http://postnoon.com/2012/09/04/chocolate/70376
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