7 tips from pastry chefs: How to make chocolate frosting?
1. All the options! Confectioners' shops are full of high-quality dark, milk and white chocolate chips, or couverture – chocolate with added cocoa butter intended directly for frosting. In both cases, the higher the fat and cocoa butter content, the better the texture and shine of the final result! The proportion of cocoa butter should be at least 30%.
Tip: Quality chocolate contains only cocoa beans, cocoa butter and sweetener, or milk powder and vanilla.
2. Fat dilutes the icing! Those who choose standard chocolate instead of couverture should dilute it to the correct liquid consistency using pure fat. This is the only way to achieve an even frosting on cakes and cookies. Cocoa butter or cold-pressed oil is stirred into the melted chocolate chips – it can be flavour neutral or even nutty.
Proportions: In the Myšák confectionery, 200 g of cocoa butter is added per kilo of melted chocolate. The cake icing is made from a kilo of chocolate and 200 ml of sunflower oil – it's easier to cut, and does not crack without being tempered.
3. Water is the enemy! Chocolate chips or blocks are often melted in a double boiler using simmering water, but a single drop of (evaporating) water can spoil everything. It will bind to the fat in the chocolate, causing it to separate from the mixture and the icing will become permanently curdled.
For the same reason the chocolate mustn't mix with butter! That too contains water, which will emulsify with the fat in the chocolate and cause the icing to thicken. A little milk can save it, but that's when regular frosting becomes ganache.
4. Temperature is crucial, too! The chocolate must not be overheated, otherwise the cocoa butter will precipitate out and grey spots will appear on the dry icing. Dark, high-percentage chocolate, or rather the cocoa butter in it, melts faster than low-percentage chocolate and can be melted at 32 to 34 °C. The temperature of the double boiler should therefore not exceed 55 °C. It's a good idea to melt the cocoa mass slowly over a low heat, stirring constantly to ensure that it melts into a solid mass.
White and milk chocolate should be melted even more slowly, at a temperature of up to 45 to 50 °C – both types have a composition of milk sugar lactose which is less resistant to higher temperatures, caramelises quickly and tends to burn and form insoluble lumps. Careful stirring is therefore necessary to prevent the chocolate from curdling and sticking to the bottom of the dish. The caramelisation will also make the coating thicker than that of dark chocolate.
Advice from pastry chefs:
Each chocolate requires a specific temperature. A quality product therefore states the temperature curve which indicates degrees Celsius suitable for melting and tempering, but also the ideal temperature of the coating.
If you have a slab of chocolate to hand, break it into similarly sized pieces – it will melt evenly without burning the parts that melt first. The bowl of chocolate should not touch the surface of the water and the water in the pan or pot should not boil rapidly, but stay below the boiling point!
If you want to melt your couverture with peace of mind, heat it in the microwave – set it on medium power and check and stir the chocolate after half a minute. Repeat three times. For white and milk chocolate, again, a lower temperature is worthwhile.
5. The chocolate icing should be tempered! In confectionery practice, this means melting the chocolate and then cooling it to slightly warm it up again to form stable beta crystals of cocoa butter. This combines with the cocoa mass to give the icing a shine and a clean break with a crunch.
The confectioners temper the chocolate by various processes. One option is to melt ⅔ of the couverture in a water bath at 45°C, remove the dish from the stove and stir in the remaining third of the drops, which melt and cool the chocolate mass at the same time. Once the temperature has dropped to 26 to 28 °C, reheat the chocolate to 30 to 33 °C.
At Myšák, tempering machines are used to temper larger quantities of chocolate, while a granite stone is useful for smaller productions. The confectioners temper only ⅔ of the melted drops, then add these to the remaining icing and whisk to the desired temperature. Dark chocolate is 32 °C, milk chocolate 30 °C and white chocolate icing 28 °C. At home, just chill the icing in a bowl of ice and stir it again carefully.
Caution! The water bath bowl is hot enough on its own, so remove it from the pot or pan a little earlier, before the temperature of the chocolate has risen to the ideal level. This way the icing has no chance to overheat.
In the Herůfka Chocolate Factory they have another tip for home tempering. Melt ⅔ of the chocolate chips with the cocoa butter (100 g chocolate to 10 g butter) in the microwave and then combine them thoroughly with the remaining chocolate.
6. Allow your cakes or cookies to cool to room temperature before decorating. The icing would not set quickly enough on warm baking, while it will not spread into a regular layer if they are cold.
7. Perfectly melted chocolate can be identified by the fact that it is glossy and does not burn on the finger, has a smooth texture and is slightly more liquid than honey.
Did you know that:
Ganache is not the same as chocolate icing! It's a basic emulsion of chocolate (fat) and cream (liquid) that is enriched with butter, flavoured or whipped into creams - filling chocolate truffles, pralines and candies, cakes and pies, as well as thinned and poured over ice cream or desserts. You can also enjoy it on its own, in the form of the famous pot de crème.
Preparation of ganache: The cream is heated to just below the boiling point and then poured over the chocolate chips. The confectioners use a trick – they first pour just a little hot cream over the chocolate and wait for it to melt. This binds the fat to the water and forms the base of the emulsion. They then add the remaining cream to the chocolate gradually, stirring the mixture from the centre to the edges. Finally, they use an immersion blender to combine it perfectly to emulsify it and get a smooth, elastic and glossy ganache.
The density and use of the ganache is determined by the ratio of chocolate to cream, but also the composition of the chocolate chips. There are many recipes for more or less concentrated ganache, but a few principles are repeated in all of them. These include crystallisation of the chocolate which takes time. The ganache for cream fillings should therefore be left in the fridge for at least 24 hours.
In Myšák, they also work with gelatine, white chocolate and vanilla ganache or caramel, butter and dark chocolate. Caramel ganache is used by the confectioners to fill Prague ballsor whipped with cream into the filling for the famous Machar cake.
Source: Ambiente confectioners
