Chocolate – How to prevent “sweating” chocolate covered strawberries

chocolatestrawberries

Last year for Valentines day, I decided I was going to be romantic and make some chocolate covered strawberries for someone special. I melted and tempered some milk chocolate. Then dipped the washed and thoroughly dried strawberries into the chocolate and put them on a plate in the refrigerator to quickly "set" the chocolate.

Later that night as my special someone and I were eating the chocolate covered strawberries, we noticed that there was condensation both on the outside and in between the chocolate and strawberry. It was delicious nonetheless, but I was curious as to why it was "sweating" and if there is anything I can do to prevent this if I decide to ever be romantic again.

Best Answer

Very simple: don't store your chocolate in the fridge. The ideal temperature for setting chocolate is 20°C. You can store it at less or more than that, but not too much. Setting in the fridge results in bad chocolate. Remember, when you work with chocolate, exact temperatures are extremely important.

Here a loose translation from a good article on chocolate/couverture coating:

good This is the usual case. You only want a temperature difference of 12° to 13° between the chocolate and its environment as well as between the chocolate and the confect interior.

interior too cold If the interior is colder than the room, the setting will happen "inside out". The cocoa butter film which gives a confect its shine will build on the inside, leaving the outside looking dull.

interior warmer This is a really good case for some types of confect, but you can't do it with most types of filling (definitely not with strawberries). Cooling from the outside gives you a beautiful shine.

later cooling If you want to achieve a good shine, it is possible to put the confects in the fridge for a short time, but only after they have cooled to 20°C at room temperature. Don't let them fall to fridge temperature, take them out at 15°C. The continued cooling from the outside is beneficial.

not enough temperature difference This shouldn't happen. The temperature difference is too small, and the confect doesn't set quick enough. In this case, cocoa butter pools on the surface and creates a yellowish layer after it hardens.

When you make your confect, you should time the first piece. The setting should need 10 minutes. If it is less, you don't get all the possible shine. If it needs more, it will get grey or whitish yellow.

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