Sweeney notes that manufacturers can modify nut pastes for easier use by tweaking factors in formulation or processing. "Stabilizers, such as 1% to 2% of hydrogenated fats, can be added to increase the melting point of the centers," he says. "However, this ingredient must appear on the label as hydrogenated, which may not reflect the image required by a premium filled candy. Thus, experienced chocolatiers may use oil-migration management techniques by working with suppliers to obtain hard fractions of palm oils, which may be more label-friendly. These will help prevent oil migration and have higher melt points so that they do not soften the chocolate coating."
Frame adds that cocoa powder can act as a barrier. "Provided that the confection is being coated in chocolate, you can put a cocoa base on it—just sprinkle it with cocoa or roll it in cocoa first to create that barrier," she says. "It's not going to last forever that way, but that will extend it some." Then again, if the chocolate is as good as it should be, it probably won't be around long enough to find out.
Kimberly J. Decker, a California-based technical writer, has a B.S. in consumer food science with a minor in English from the University of California, Davis. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she enjoys eating and writing about food. You can reach her at
kim@decker.net.
Cocoa Compensation
At a time when Americans are spending less on everything, a bull market for high-end chocolates might seem unlikely, but it's true. Research firm Mintel, Chicago, in its "U.S. Premium Chocolate Confectionery" report, points to premium products as the chocolate category's main driver of growth, with premium sales increasing 129% from 2001 to reach $2.05 billion in 2006, or about 13% of the total chocolate market. Mintel projects those sales to hit over $3.55 billion by 2011.
Economic downturns may dampen those prospects, but not if consumers like Erin O'Donnell and her colleagues at David Michael & Co., Philadelphia, have anything to do with it. "We have a whole drawer-full of premium chocolates at our desk, and we definitely delve into them more on ‘bad' days," says the marketing manager at the flavor company. And why do people like her shell out for the good stuff? "Because it makes you feel better about yourself," O'Donnell says. "Obviously, chocolate can lift your spirits."
Courtney LeDrew, marketing manager, Cargill Cocoa & Chocolate, Lititz, PA, has noticed a similar pattern. "There is a continued shift from consumers purchasing chocolate as a gift for someone else to purchasing it as a gift for themselves because it is an affordable indulgence," she says. In the aforementioned Times article, Marcia Mogelonsky, senior analyst at Mintel, is quoted as saying of premium chocolate purchases: "It's not like buying a car. You can still scrape together a few dollars when you need that little boost." Experts call this "compensatory consumption": the attempt, when circumstances weigh on us, to treat ourselves to luxuries that, while affordable, still reaffirm our sense of worth.
Other factors that Mintel credits with boosting premium chocolate's prospects include heightened interest in chocolates flavored with "novel" ingredients, dark chocolates, and news about dark-chocolate flavanols' potential to reduce the risk for stroke, heart disease, cancer, and diabetes. As O'Donnell says: "With all the healthy associations of chocolate, and of dark chocolate specifically, people justify themselves by saying, ‘Well, I could have a whole bowl of ice cream, or I could have a couple pieces of this dark chocolate bar and that's probably better for me altogether."
Defining Moments
What, exactly, does "premium" mean with respect to chocolate? FDA has strict standards of identity to protect the integrity of all chocolates, but it has yet to lay down a legally binding definition of premium.
But the existing standards, found in Title 21 of the Code of Federal Regulations, Part 163, are a start. They specify which ingredients, and in what ranges, can appear in a product labeled as chocolate. For example, sweet chocolate shall contain no less than 15% by weight of chocolate liquor (the semiplastic mass produced from grinding cacao bean nibs). Chocolate liquor itself shall contain no less than 50% and no more than 60% by weight of cacao fat. In milk chocolate, the minimum percentage of chocolate liquor is 10%, while the requirement for total milk solids is no less than 12%. The standards go on to cover white chocolate, buttermilk chocolate and more, but for all chocolate types, they allow the use of nutritive carbohydrate sweeteners; spices and flavorings that do not mimic chocolate, milk or butter; and emulsifiers not exceeding 1% of the formula weight.
Perhaps the most important restriction is on the type of fat allowed. Chocolate may contain no fats other than cocoa butter pressed from cacao nibs and the dairy fat derived from any milk products used in the formula. (Emulsifiers like soy lecithin contribute negligible fat.) That means no vegetable oils and no handy hydrogenated fats can show up if the product still wants to call itself chocolate. "If vegetable fats are added, then the coating is a compound and cannot be called chocolate," says John Sweeney, director of technology, Cargill Cocoa & Chocolate, Lititz, PA.