chocolate tempering machines - Do they work?
 

Hi,

I'm interested in purchasing a tempering machine if they really work. Any
advice. Are they reliable to temper every time or is it still a hit and
miss proposition?

Thanks,

David

"Prometheus7" > wrote in message
. ..
> Hi,
>
> I'm interested in purchasing a tempering machine if they really work. Any
> advice. Are they reliable to temper every time or is it still a hit and
> miss proposition?
>
> Thanks,
>
> David
>

I have a tempering machine that sees heavy use. It works, but I've found
over time that it can still be a somewhat tempermental process. (Pardon the
pun! <G>) I've found that, to be safe, it's a good idea to set the working
temperature at the lower end of the range (86-88), rather than the higher
end. And during the cooling phase, I bring it down to 80, which is lower
than one would technically need to. (I've checked the chocolate temperature
with an instant thermometer a few times, and the machine temperature has
always been accurate, which leads me to believe that the difference is in
the chocolate, the cocoa butter I sometimes add, or the room temperature and
humidity.) I'm sure that if I were working in a fully climate-controlled
space, it would be less of an issue.

The machine I have is the ACMC product that tempers up to 8 lbs. I have no
experience with the Chocovision models, but generally they have lower
capacity for the price (they also make high-capacity machines, but they are
significantly more expensive). A drawback of the model I have is that it is
difficult to clean.

I think that the question is what are you planning to use it for? If you
only need to temper small quantities at a time, you might visit Ebay, find
Chocovision's store, and see if they are selling any of their smaller
reconditioned Sinsation machines. I think that they usually go for no more
than $300, possibly less. Chocovision makes a model called the Revolation
that is larger and more expensive than the Sinsation, but cheaper than their
$1500 professional models. The model I have runs about $700.

There is no doubt that for production of anything above a small batch for
personal use, the tempering machine saves a huge amount of time, labor, and
uncertainty.