Hello Dr. Chris Cheers, or whomsoever else would care to comment on my culinary quandaries.
I am a chef and somewhat new to the world of ultrasonics. I am interested in the feasibility of using a sonicator as part of the chocolate making process. From what I have read thus far it seems as though ultrasonics may be able to facilitate in many aspects of chocolate production. But, to begin this discussion I would like to talk about the possibility of ultrasonic milling on a small scale.
As chocolate production is practiced now, the nibs (the inner “meat” of the cocoa bean) are ground (like coffee beans except much much finer) and transformed into a dark liquid known as cocoa liquor (cocoa liquor is comprised of 50% cocoa solids and 50% cocoa butter). The grinding of the nibs does two things:
1.
It breaks open the bean cells to release the cocoa butter and
2.
Breaks those cell particles down so they are imperceptible to the tongue as “gritty”.
The final particle size needs to be between 15-30 microns. in order for the finished chocolate product to have that familiar velvety mouth feel.
So, my question is, if I do an initial grinding of nibs and transform them into a chocolate liquid that has the approximate viscosity of motor oil with cocoa solids suspended in the liquid – do you think that a sonicator could break apart those cocoa solids to 15-30 microns?
I would be happy to provide more chocolate making details if necessary. For purposes of experimentation I have a sonicator XL 2020 with a ½” flat tip.
Thank you for your time.
Regards
Matt.