Why does chocolate need to be refined?
Refining (conche&refine) is an important step to transform cocoa beans into chocolate.
The most basic way to make chocolate is to refine it with cocoa nibs/cream that have been removed from the shell after baking. Sugar, cocoa butter, milk powder or other raw materials are added during the refining process, and the result is the familiar dark/milk chocolate that we are well known.
One of the functions of chocolate fine grinding is to promote the volatilization of acidic substances. Even if cocoa beans are fully fermented, dried, and roasted, the acidic substances contained in it are still undesirably high. In addition to promoting the volatilization of acid substances, another purpose of chocolate refining is to promote water volatilization. As oil and water are insoluble, too much water in chocolate will increase the viscosity of chocolate (when the water content is >1%, for commercial mass production, 1% oil must be added to balance the viscosity for every 0.3% more water). After the cocoa beans are roasted, the water content will be reduced from 7% after drying to about 2%; after fine grinding, the water content may drop to 1%.
While refining, the cocoa nibs and sugar crystals contained in the chocolate are also being refined. Refining allows the particles in the chocolate to be ground to 20-30 microns (the structure of the human tongue cannot distinguish particles below 50 microns), and then the goal of smooth and good-tasting chocolate is achieved.
Attention: Never add water during the chocolate grinding process, otherwise the chocolate will clump and the chocolate conche will not work.
Then how to get a bright chocolate product after refining? Please see the next step chocolate tempering.
