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I mean, sort of—they're not exactly pers-
Hey guys, salut.
Welcome back to the chocolate series in which I am tracking down,
you know, step-by-step the perfect bar of chocolate.
This time, I'm going one step ahead since I'm gonna make roasted nibs...from whole beans.
So I'm currently heading to the second district in Paris,
to a place called Rrraw, which is in fact the supplier of the roasted nibs we used in the previous episode.
The bean is black.
It's black, but with purple reflections.
Right. purple.
Chocolate bitterness, we know
mainly comes from inappropriate roasting.
When you roast food, you induce bitterness,
and you add new flavors as well.
It's standing miles away from the chocolate I know,
but it's good.
It's a new taste for me.
Good.
Here you got 2 kg of pure beans,
Criollo beans from Peruvian Amazonia.
"Rrraw" quality
It will bring additional flavors, but it would be a shame to burn them,
and to lose those floral notes.
I'll be super careful.
Got the beans – let's roast them. It looks like I'm smuggling stuff.
Right. So the roasting process is not rocket science, but you have to be thorough.
We are starting at 180 degrees Celsius, which is 360 degrees Fahrenheit,
and we are just going down 10 degrees every 5 minutes,
so that would be 180, 170, 160, 150,
and then we hold on to 150 for as long as we need to reach out to a specific surface temperature
that I will just inform you about as soon as I – as I have it myself.
Smells a bit fresh. Oops, I lost one.
Smells chocolatey yes, but it also smells fresh,
A bit tangy, it's not very powerful.
It's just subtle and delicate at the moment.
Oops. Lost another one.
170° Celsius
I didn't get the timing right.
Last temperature drop; I'm going to 150° and basically I'm gonna stay there
until I get a surface temperature of 125° Celsius. That's 266° Fahrenheit.
I'm at the moment at 118° Celsius, I reckon it probably needs 5 to 10 minutes.
Now why is it important to follow this descending curve, as known as to start high and end up lower?
Well, first of all starting high just helps with the "pop", with separating layers from one another.
Then the lower heat over time slowly, but surely,
just to get more control over the cooking process.
126°, 127° that's good
The smell is definitely warmer, and not just because the oven tray's piping hot.
No, I've got some warmer aromas of toasted, caramelized coffee, cocoa, chocolate.
Makes sense, huh?
It's been about 30 minutes. The beans have cooled down completely.
I guess you would think that you could basically rub your thumb or whatever and just remove the skin,
but the problem is more complicated. Let me show you.
You see when you try to remove the skin,
in fact, the nibs inside - they crumble into all those tiny little pieces.
And believe it or not, I actually got a method that was kindly given to me,
shared with me by my friend, Sune from Denmark,
who's doing amazing chocolate on his own. I'll post a link to his stuff in the description down below.
He basically told me to store all these roasted beans inside a big ziploc bag,
and then to use a rolling pin onto that bag and crush those beans a few times
until all these nibs are separated from the husk. I like this word so much:
the "husk"
Now as satisfying and as soothing for stress and for the soul,
it's not helping, 'cause I need to separate the husk: this,
from the nib: this.
I need to separate basically a tiny bit from another tiny bit, and they are all nicely…
I've been doing heavy research on, like three pictures basically,
just to understand more what's ahead of us.
What's ahead of us is the winnowing process,
basically the action of separating husk from grains,
or lighter, fluffier particles from heavier, denser, sometimes smaller particles
using a combination of both gravity and
air displacement, as known as wind, or just movement maybe.
That could theoretically work. In fact, I'm gonna try it right now.
I don't feel very much like I'm living in the 21st century. But, let's try this.
Not bad.
It's not great, but it's not bad. Have a look.
So I've got some nibs in this first tray. I also got a bit of husk right there.
And then I've got husk in this catching tray right there.
I think blowing air through it could work on another channel, but not on this channel.
I need to come up with something more consistent, more thorough, more reliable,
and also that would involve maybe a bit more power.
There's a gentle flow of air coming from this end.
This method definitely works, but I've got two concerns about this:
the first one is that it seems to be quite time-consuming.
But it's nothing compared to the second one - Look at this mess everywhere.
There could be a solution to do this outside.
Then you would need a garden, and I don't h–
Hmm
So I've been conducting my research a bit further by just watching YouTube videos.
it should be doable to just build a machine with a bit of tubing,
and just the right amount of airflow and–and you know, curves and then straight lines.
It's a bit rough at the moment yes, I admit,
but I guess guys, it sounds like a plan.
I'm gonna try building my own winnowing contraption/super effective machine.
I like the second part of that sentence.
I hope you guys enjoyed this episode. I'm gonna go back doing some research and we'll catch up in the next one.
Take care, bye bye.
Salut.