Exploring the diverse world of chocolate: A comprehensive guide

Hi and welcome to Bold Baking Basics, this is where we get stuck into the fundamentals of baking. These videos are about getting you to bake with confidence, anytime, anywhere. So let's talk about chocolate, it's really important for me that you know about chocolate because not all chocolate is created equal, and how do you know what to use and in which recipe. I've got some really fun facts about chocolate that you can find on BiggerBolderBaking.com. So around the world, chocolate can look different, however, universally, it is graded by cocoa percentage. Once you know the percentage, you'll know exactly what chocolate you need to use. Here are some really fun facts about chocolate that every Bold Baker needs to know. So we're gonna start out at the bottom of the scale. Milk chocolate. Now milk chocolate ranges from 38% cocoa solids to 42% cocoa solids. This is sweeter than it is bitter. There's way more sugar in this chocolate and less cocoa butter. So it's a little less chocolatey, it's not as a high quality of chocolate that I would normally use in baking, often you'll find it in candy bars, it'll be given to kids, it's sweeter, it's a little bit chocolatey but not exactly what I use for baking. Does taste good though. If you like chocolate that has no bitterness and is quite sweet, this is the chocolate for you. This actually works really well in my s'more fudge recipe. So now we're gonna move up the scale, our next chocolate is semi-sweet, this is very commonly used in baking, this is 52% to 62% cocoa solids. So we're a little bit more bitter than the milk chocolate, less sweet, a nice balance. If you're newer to bitter chocolate, this is a really great one to start with. I love to use this in baking, it melts really well, it's inexpensive, it's good quality, it has a nice balance, this is really really common. So I like to use this in my chocolate chip cookie pie and my s'mores cheesecake. So my next chocolate is bittersweet chocolate. Now this is 63% to 72% cocoa solids. Now as you can see as we go up the scale, the quality of the chocolate is actually getting better. It's getting less sweet and it's getting a little bit more bitter. This is what I use pretty much in everything. It is great in baking. It's called bittersweet because there's less sugar and it has that bitterness. Now bitterness is not a bad word, bitterness is not something that's yucky, it actually is flavor, it's depth, it's exactly what you want from your chocolate, the perfect balance of bitter and sweet. If you like dark chocolate, this is the chocolate for you, it really adds great flavor to your baking. As we go up in cocoa solids, chocolate can become a little bit trickier to melt, it can become a little bit more temperamental, so always take care when melting chocolate, don't do it too fast, nice and low and slow and you'll be okay. So one of my favorite recipes to use this chocolate in is my best ever chocolate chip cookies. And I'll tell you why. I don't use chips in my chocolate chip cookies, I use this. I get a nice big bar, I chop it up, you have all different sized chunks, and you have that lovely richness in your cookies. So definitely 72% for those cookies. Also I like to use this in my German chocolate cake. So bittersweet, 63% to 72%, my absolute favorite go-to chocolate. Now the next chocolate I want to show you is on the extreme side of the scale, this is 100% cocoa solids. So that means no sugar added. Now let me tell you the good things about this chocolate and then the bad things. It's very good quality. It's really really good quality, full of cocoa solids, richness, depth, everything. That's great. What it doesn't have, it doesn't have sugar. So it is quite raw tasting and waxy so you do not want to eat this by itself and if you're You're going to use this in a recipe, what I like to do is mix it with a little bit of semi-sweet or a little bit of bittersweet, I don't use this all by itself. So if you buy a bar that says 100% don't use that, mix it with something else. Because this has such a high cocoa solid as well it can actually be quite tricky to melt. So just keep an eye out for this, like I've bought it by mistake sometimes and I don't know what to do with it but just add it in to other chocolate and it will boost up the The cocoa will make it a little bit darker and then the other chocolate will add sweetness to it. Mixed with another chocolate to make it a little bit sweeter, this would work well in my chocolate bundt cake. So let's talk chocolate chips. Generally these are semi-sweet, nice and sweet, a little bit bitter, really good for baking. The difference between chocolate chips and other bars is that these contain stabilizers. These are manufactured to keep their shape so you use them in cookies, pies, somewhere where they're supposed to stay intact. you don't want to use these for is in a melted recipe so like say a ganache, chocolate sauce, something like that. These are supposed to serve their purpose as chocolate chips and that's it. I like to use chocolate chips in my chocolate brownie cookies and my triple grams. So our next chocolate is technically not chocolate. So it's different to the other chocolates that I just showed you. This doesn't fall on the same scale and I'll tell you why. It doesn't contain any cocoa solids. All this is, is cocoa butter mixed with sugar, a little bit of milk solids, maybe a little bit of flavor. It doesn't contain chocolate like the other ones do, so it's not graded as actual chocolate. Now, when you're baking with this, please be very careful when you're melting it because it can be a little bit temperamental. The one thing I will beg of you is please use good quality white chocolate. Bad quality white chocolate doesn't taste anything like it. It's kind of waxy, it's got no flavor. please when you're using this buy a good quality bar. I like to use white chocolate in my pumpkin and white chocolate lava cake and my chocolate profiteroles. So let's talk cocoa powder, a super important ingredient. Cocoa powder is what's left over when cocoa butter is extracted from the cocoa bean. So one type is unsweetened cocoa powder. I use this a lot in baking. Please make sure that the package says unsweetened cocoa powder you do not want extra sugar in your cocoa powder because it will throw off your recipe as always please buy good quality it's a really great staple to have in your cupboard just so you know I've said this before hot chocolate is not a replacement for cocoa powder okay hot chocolate powder is not cocoa powder so just remember I said that I like to use unsweetened cocoa powder in my homemade hot chocolate recipe and my homemade Nutella so our next up is Dutch process also known as a European style cocoa powder there is a big difference between these two and I'll tell you what they are. It has been treated with an alkalining agent so as you can see it is a different color, it's a lovely dark color and I really love how it looks in recipes. The thing about this is that it's not bitter, it's really smooth. Unsweetened cocoa powder can have a tendency to be a little bit bitter and I do get comments about that. If you don't like that bitterness, buy some Dutch Process cocoa powder, it's really great, keep it in your cupboard, it lasts for months on end. The one thing about using Dutch Process is that in your recipe you have to leaven it with an acid so you have to leaven it with baking soda or something like that because it has been treated. I like to use Dutch Process cocoa powder in my homemade Oreos and in my Baileys chocolate pudding. So I hope you found this useful, all the information can be found on my website and I'll see you back here really soon for more Bigger Bolder Baking.