A few months ago, a friend of mine found a
chocolate bar making set at the local flea market. Knowing I was in a Professional Chocolatier program, she picked it up for me, reasoning that even if the contents of the kit itself weren't any good, the decorative tin that the molds and recipe book came in was worth the deeply discounted price. As I flipped through the recipe booklet, I thought they sounded interesting. I was particularly curious about two that involved shortbread cookies -- one layered with lemon curd and the other with caramel. And so last weekend, I decided it was time to test it out.
I started on Thursday evening making the shortbread cookies for the caramel shortbread chocolate bars. I was immediately suspicious of the cookie cutter included in the kit. It just barely fit inside the bar molds. I couldn't imagine how the resulting shortbread would fit into the molds once they were shelled with chocolate. Nevertheless, I decided to use it. I opened up the recipe booklet and was very confused by the instructions in front of me that called for cream and jam. Then I realized that there was a misprint in the booklet -- though the heading said caramel shortbread, the recipe was for some sort of jam and ganache layered bar. I flipped to the second recipe titled caramel shortbread and proceeded to make the shortbread.
The shortbread recipe was simple enough and it made a small quantity, which was perfect. But there was no salt in it, so I decided to add some for flavour and balance. I cut my cookies, still confused by the size of the cutter, and arranged them on a baking sheet. The instructions called for a 400F oven and 20 minutes of baking. I immediately knew that would lead to burnt shortbread. Instead, I heated my oven to 350F and baked them for 15 minutes -- and even then they were well done (but I assumed that would be an advantage when layering them with caramel). I put them in an airtight container once they cooled.
Then on Sunday I decided to temper some milk chocolate and proceed with making the bars. I painted the silicone molds with two coats of chocolate before sprinkling some pink Himalayan salt into the cavities and then piping in a layer of caramel. Then the moment of truth arrived. I was ready to place the shortbread cookies on top of the pool of caramel.
Well, guess what? They didn't fit. At all.
So I had to place each one on a cutting board and very carefully saw off the edges of the cookies with a serrated knife. There. Now they fit into the shells perfectly. To finish off the bars, I capped them with more milk chocolate and let them set in the fridge for five minutes. Once they were set, I carefully unmolded them and left them to crystallize for 24 hours before wrapping them in foil and pretty scrapbook paper.
The verdict? Well, I have some very pretty chocolate bars and frankly they do taste delicious. The texture of the crunchy shortbread against the creamy caramel and the smooth milk chocolate is great. But silicone molds are dreadful. I was impressed with the shine of the unmolded bars -- something that many say isn't possible with silicone -- but the actual process of shelling and capping was tedious as best. The usual methods of tapping and scraping off excess chocolate just don't work.
Nevertheless, I'm really glad that I had the chance to make these bars using this set. Not only did it confirm the value of polycarbonate molds for production, but also the shape of bar that I'd like to be making. Before making these, I probably would have purchased the rectangular bars with the very sharp corners. But once the bars were unmolded and I was wrapping them, I preferred the ones that were rounded.
I'm also really glad to have taken the time to continue practicing the techniques that I learned in my program and to have experimented with a cookie layer -- which I'm sure I'll do again.
