Bunny McElwee wrote:
> Thanks to everyone for the quick responses. Yes, I am using plain
> chocolate, mainly for dipping cookies, some truffle like candies,
> nothing fancy, and I do it in BIG lots, so using coture is not an
> option, moneywise. I'll save that for my Chocolate Fountain time.

You aren't using "plain" chocolate, you are using "summer coating" or "candy
melts" or "compound chocolate"--whatever you want to call it--which, as a
professional candy maker told me years ago before I became a professional,
isn't really chocolate.

You DEFINITELY don't want to try using couverture in a chocolate fountain.
Chocolate fountains are designed to use inexpensive thinned "chocolate" of
the type you are already using--and they aren't thinning it with cocoa
butter because then it would be really expensive. Every chocolate sold for
fountains that I've seen is a thinner-when-melted version of candy melts.

If you are going to use candy melts, it seems to be generally agreed that
Merckens has far and away the best taste.

As to equipment, one inexpensive setup that works well if tempering is not
an issue is putting a heating pad inside a larger bowl, making a warm nest
for a metal bowl containing the melted candy melts. If the heating pad has
heating controls, so much the better.