Enrobing is a simple method and, as a chocolatier, one that I use frequently to finish my chocolates and confections. Also referred to as “dipping”, enrobing is simply the act of covering an item in chocolate. The beauty of enrobing is that you don’t need to make the chocolate from scratch in order to enrobe — you can use pre bought chocolate, such as your favourite chocolate bar ( raw or cooked ) or you can use cacao paste.
Recently, I have really taken to using cacao paste/mass/ liquor to enrobing my confections as it’s easy, fast and there’s no sugar added to it at all. Cacao paste ( also referred to as cacao mass or cacao liquor ) is 100% cacao and that’s all!
When you’re enrobing something sweet, you don’t need to have sweet chocolate around it — the sweetness of the enrobed confection is generally enough to shine through the bitterness of the 100% cacao and, in fact, the bitterness adds a lovely layer of flavour and complexity to the finished product.
Try these Coffee Star Anise Meltaways to practice your enrobing skills and because they’re so yummy!
Enrobing
Instructions
Using pre-made chocolate
- Get your chocolate in temper and at about 28°C
- Have any garnish you’d like to use to decorate the chocolate in a ramekin or something easy to grab from.
- The confection shouldn’t be straight out of the freezer–– if it’s been frozen, allow it to come to cool room temp before enrobing. If they are coming right from the fridge, let them sit at room temp for 10-15 mins before enrobing.
- Set yourself up so that the confection is set to your left (reverse if you are left-handed). Put a fork and your bowl of melted chocolate in front of you, and a tray lined with greaseproof or a teflex lined dehydrator tray is set to your right.
- Drop one confection into the bowl of chocolate.
- Use your fork to push it into the chocolate and then fish it out––avoid dragging it up the side of the bowl.
- Tap the fork on the side of the bowl and swipe the bottom of the fork along the edge of the bowl to remove excess chocolate.
- For aesthetic reasons, take your time to ensure you have removed as much excess as possible, otherwise you will end up with a puddle under your finished confection.
- If you want to coat the confection in something, like desiccated coconut, drop it into the bowl of coconut and coat fully.
- Lift the chocolate out of the crumb, shake off the excess and place on the empty tray to your right.
- If you simply want to sprinkle some garnish on top of the item, do so after dipping and placing on the prepared tray.
- As the chocolate cools, it’ll thicken, simply give it a tiny bit of heat on the double boiler again as before, just to loosen it up.
- Once all chocolates are enrobed and garnished, set the tray in the fridge for about 5 minutes and then allow to set the remainder of the way at room temp.
Video
Get yourself some chocolate dipping forks for enrobing like a pro.
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