Tempering Chocolate
After conching, the chocolate mixture is 60-75*C and needs to be cooled to around 40*C to allow stable crystallization of the cocoa butter. Cocoa butter is basically made of six types of crystals which melt at different temperatures. By tempering cocoa butter goes through a number of variations of temperatures and an inner grid of stable crystals is formed. The process produces a chocolate that is shiny and smooth, with a homogenous and silky texture. The melted chocolate eventually comes out of a tap!
Tempering is a very critical process of making gorgeous chocolate. To temper chocolate, you heat and melt it (around 40*C) and then cool it down very quickly, as the most stable of the six fat crystals in cocoa butter, used to prompt the crystallization of the others, crystallizes at the lower temperature. When tempering isn’t properly carried out the result is a grainy, crunchy chocolate with no shine, and possibly a grey or white film on the surface called ‘bloom’ (which is the fat coming to the top). If you have ever tasted a chocolate bar that crunches with crystals or has a powdery texture, it is because something went wrong with the tempering process.
