at Sun, 30 Nov 2003 01:49:35 GMT in <pviisv8n7jfrtjk4ugu3vp13qrnuct7767@
4ax.com>, (shipwreck) wrote :

>If I were to replace 5 oz. of chocolate with sweetened cocoa powder,
>how much do I add?

This is a complex question and would depend on how sweet the chocolate you
had to start with was, how much sugar was in your "sweetened cocoa powder",
and whether the cocoa was high-fat or low-fat. However, I can give you the
data for straight unsweetened chocolate vs. cocoa, and then some examples.

Straight unsweetened (chocolate liquor) is about 50% cocoa butter, 50%
defatted cocoa solids. The defatted cocoa solids are what give chocolate
most of its taste. Meanwhile, unsweetened cocoa has 2 main variants, high-
fat, with about 24% fat, and low-fat, with about 9%. So it's either 76% or
91% defatted cocoa solids. Therefore, speaking strictly from a flavour
intensity standpoint, the proper ratios are either 2/3 (2 parts cocoa
substitutes for 3 parts chocolate) or 5/9.

Once you add sugar, things become more complicated. Most quality sweetened
chocolates, usually called "couverture" have something in the range of 40-
45% cocoa butter. A chocolate should also list its cocoa solids percentage,
the total percentage of both defatted cocoa and cocoa butter. Finally,
there's the sugar percentage. If you look in the industry, you'll see
things like "60/40/40" which means 60% cocoa solids, 40% fat, 40% sugar.
It's rare that you'll find this sort of useful labelling in retail, but
commonly you'll see the cocoa solids percentage listed, which gives you a
good start, because the variability of cocoa butter is only in a narrow
window, and with that you can make a reasonable guess. If you assume that a
chocolate has about 40% cocoa butter, which will be good enough most of the
time, then a chocolate with 70% cocoa solids thus has 30% defatted cocoa
solids. You simply subtract 40 from the claimed cocoa solids percentage.
When it's a low percentage (below about 55%), however, you need to reduce
your estimate of the amount of cocoa butter, generally to somewhere around
35%. (Side note: this is why sweet dark chocolate almost always seems a bit
dry and grainy. Lower cocoa butter makes for a rougher, drier texture).
Armed with all these figures, the straight cocoa substitution ratio should
be 91 or 76 divided by the amount of defatted cocoa solids you estimated.

The sugar substitution, however, is a breeze, if you've got the cocoa
solids percent: simply subtract that figure from 100, and the resulting
number gives the ratio: it's (number/100) times the amount of chocolate the
recipe called for.

However, you can't just eliminate all that fat in a recipe that assumed you
had it. And here's where things become *really* complicated. You have to
substitute some other fat for the cocoa butter. Most of the time this is
going to be unsalted butter. But dairy butter has different properties than
cocoa butter. For instance cookies made with chocolate will be more fudgy,
those with butter crispy. Cakes with butter are dense and rich; those with
cocoa butter lean towards a silkier, smoother texture. So expect your
results to be different. Even using the closest direct fat substitute, palm
kernel oil, doesn't yield quite the same texture as cocoa butter.
Furthermore, the calculation of the amount needed is even more complex. You
need first to multiply the amount of chocolate your recipe called for by
40% (0.4) for sweetened chocolate, 50%(0.5) for unsweetened. Then you need
to multiply the amount of cocoa you substituted by either 9% (0.09) or 24%
(0.24). Then you subtract the figure you just found from the one you got
for the chocolate, and this gives you approximately the amount of butter
you need to add. If you want to be *really* technical, you actually need to
multiply the figure you found by 1.25 for butter, to allow for the fact
that butter has some water and other non-fat constituents.

Thoroughly confused at this point? Here's a couple of examples. Let's say
you had a cake that called for 5 oz semisweet chocolate. Meanwhile, your
chocolate claims 60% cocoa solids. You can then safely assume it's a
"60/40". Fat percentage and sugar percentage are both 40%. So, you need
5*0.4 = 2 oz sugar. Imagine that your cocoa on hand has 24% fat. The amount
of cocoa, then, that you need is ((60-40)/76*5) = (5/19)*5 = 1.3 oz (close
enough to 1 1/3 oz). And the amount of butter is
((0.4*5)-(0.24*1.3))*1.25 = 2.11 oz ( approximately 4 tbsp and a tsp)

Or imagine a mousse that asked for 8 oz bittersweet chocolate. In this
case, take that the chocolate you were using had 70% cocoa solids. Sugar
percentage is 30%, fat percentage 40%. Using the same 24% cocoa, you'd then
need (30/76)*8 = 15/38*8. 15/38 is virtually identical to 0.4, so the
amount of cocoa is 3.2 oz. Sugar is 0.3*8 = 2.4 oz, and butter (which
should work OK in this as long as you cream it well with the sugar) is
((0.4*8)-(0.24*3.2))*1.25 = 3 oz (3.04, to be exact)

If you were to try to substitute with pre-sweetened cocoa, you'd have to
know the percent of sugar the manufacturer had added. I don't know of a
manufacturer who states this on the label, so it's essentially impossible
use pre-sweetened cocoa to substitute. I don't recommend it.

>I currently make a great hazelnut torte, but hate the fact that the
>chopped semi-sweet chocolate ends up as little pieces of chunks,
>regardless of the melting process in the oven for 50 minutes.

Without your recipe, it's hard to draw exact conclusions. But before trying
to substitute cocoa, one of the following 2 modifications will probably
work better:

1) Melt your chocolate instead of chopping it. Chopped chocolate added as
is rarely melts completely in an oven. Even if it does, it doesn't mix into
surrounding stuff This is why Ruth Wakefield's attempt to make chocolate
cookies with chocolate chunks backfired so spectacularly, to our collective
eternal gratitude.

2) If the recipe includes nothing but chocolate and nuts, and the idea is
to use the chocolate as a "binder", sort of like the function of cement in
concrete, try grating it. Grated chocolate melts much more evenly and
quickly than chopped chocolate, and the end product will be more uniform.
Even in this case, however, I'd consider melting and mixing the best
option.

If you're determined to press on with cocoa, substituting butter, sugar,
and cocoa will probably work at least passably. But expect it to be a
little different, and there's always the chance that it will fail miserably
if the recipe absolutely counts on the unique properties of cocoa butter.


--
Alex Rast

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