Here are just a few things I’ve learned over the years about chocolate decorating.

chocolate-decorations

I hope these tips will help you with planning your decorating projects.

1. Getting a chocolate tempering machine is a sweet investment. Look for Chocovision’s “Mini Rev”, which is the cheapest machine you can find and perfect for the home chef. You can sometimes pick one up for half price from a Dove Chocolatier when they have a sale.

2. Timing is of the utmost importance, have everything organized and work fast. Most decorating is done while chocolate is melted, or semi-melted. You have only minutes (sometimes seconds) to make your fabulous decorations, because your chocolate will harden and become unworkable.

3. Use a good high quality chocolate, it’s easier to work with and tastes better. I use Guittard for dark and El Rey for white.

4. Practice new chocolate decorating techniques and ideas with confectionary coating to save time and money. Works just like real chocolate, but is cheaper and you don’t have to temper it. Confectionary is chocolate FLAVORED candy.

5. Be aware of the temperature of your environment, chocolate melts, sad but true (unless it’s in your mouth, in that case it’s a good thing).

6. Many household items work great as molds and supplies. Look around, you’d be surprised with what you can find and use for making chocolate decorations. Things like paper towel roll inserts to shape flower petals, plastic containers for molds, and art tools for detailing work great. Just make sure they are non toxic. For art supplies such as paint brushes and sculpting tools, reserve a clean set to use for decorating food only.

7. Become friends with a baker, pastry chef, or candy maker, and save moola on chocolate. You’ll have a study supply of bulk chocolate at your finger tips.

8. If tempering by hand, practice a few times before making decorations.

9. The beauty of chocolate decorating, is that even your mistakes are still good enough to eat.

Is there anything you would like to add to this list? leave a suggestion in the comments section below!

Until next time,

Peace, Love, Chocolate,

Katreece
The Chocolate Addict.com

NOTE: please understand that I am an academically challenged right-brainer, and forgive any typos, grammatical faux pas, and things that don’t make sense.