I’m making the Chocolate Pinecone cake this weekend so last night I thought I’d go ahead and make the chocolate fondant.
I made 1/2 recipe and halved everything correctly. I knead and knead for 15 minutes and the thing is smooth but not satiny like Rose said in the book. Also, it tears apart. I’m not sure if it’s supposed to at this point and maybe it’ll behave once it’s rolled between the 2 plastic wrap.
I then added more water and knead again and it’s still the same consistency. I don’t think I’ve added too little water because I added some more and yielded the same result. At this point, thinking maybe I’m doing it backwards, I added a bit more powdered sugar. And I think it’s still the same consistency.
This is 30 minutes already, kneading, and though it’s a small lump of fondant, my wimpy arms are sore. So I wrap it in plastic and it’s in the fridge.
Has anyone made this before? Any thoughts on whether I’m on the right path or completely wrong?
If all else fails, I’m going to attempt making regular fondant and color it brown (or add some cocoa powder).
Jenn, I made the chocolate fondant a while back and I had the same problems you are having. It kept cracking and ripping. I was thinking that maybe there is too much powdered sugar in the recipe itself but I haven’t tried it again. I was also thinking that if I used half chocolate fondant and half chocolate plastique/clay it would be alot more managable. I will have to try it out some time and see if that helps. I really like the taste of Rose’s chocolate fondant and I think that it would taste even better with half chocolate plastique ( made with real chocolate of course )
Liza, I just looked at chocolate plastic and it looks/sounds awesome. The name sound scary (who wants to eat plastic) but looking at the ingredients (chocolate) it sounds good!
I just endured an afternoon of chocolate rolled fondant wrestling. I used the nice shortening from Whole Foods, made it the day before, and still found the resulting fondant more fragile than ever. I have covered cakes with this recipe off and on for 25 years, but yesterday may be my last go. While the fondant was supple enough to roll beautifully with no cracks, when I slid the oblivion torte under it and rolled it gently off my pin, the fondant simply broke off, leaving the circular part on the top of the cake. I rerolled and tried again, but the same results! Finally, I tidied the edges of the circle on the top and cut strips to cover the side. That’s right, it two short strips because the fondant was so fragile.
I would love a class in this stuff, because I’ve only ever made it from “book knowledge.”
According to Hector, the recipe in the Cake Bible isn’t flexible enough to drape over edges/corners, which is why the presentation in the book shows separate pieces for the top and sides.
I do think there’s a commerically available chocolate fondant that’s more bendable, but I don’t know the name.
While Hector and others have declared it unworkable for drapping, I, working with just TCB and faith in Rose, believed it could be done so I did. I covered mostly 9 inch cakes, but also 10 and 12 inch oblivion tortes with just a bit of cracking over the surface. This time the texture was different from my last shot at this 2 years ago on a stacked 6 and 10 inch layering of oblivion torte. Maybe too much forum reading was the difference! Could fear have made this task impossible?
But I really don’t know what the fondant should be like since I’ve never seen/tasted anyone elses. While a video would be helpful, I want a class setting where I could feel the fondant, see how it reacts, and learn how it should be. Who will teach this?
Commercially available chocolate fondant can come from:
Bakels/Pettinice - this is my favorite chocolate brand. It is supple, but can crack on the corners of square cakes. Spray a little bit of pan release or rub a bit of shortening on your hands and smooth the fondant. It is the oils from your hands that will help “close” the tiny little cracks.
Albert Uster Imports/Massa Grishuna - this chocolate fondant is drier by comparison and benefits from mixing with a little bit of regular (white, non-chocolate) fondant to make it a little more supple.
CalJava/Sweet Inspirations/FondX/Elite - all of these are from the same company - CalJava - in California (known as Sweet Inspirations in Australia). I haven’t used them but a lot of bakers I know like them.
Satin Ice - I am not a big fan of this brand in general, but I use their colored fondants all the time (beats coloring your own, especially for vibrant colors and black! I don’t use it to cover cakes, but I will use it to color the AUI offwhite fondant and go from there) they have a chocolate fondant but again I’ve never used it.
I’m wondering if any of you have ever tried doing half plain (vanilla) fondant and half of Rose’s chocolate fondant recipe?? I’m working with just the chocolate fondant right now and am having a heck of a time with it so I was thinking maybe tomorrow I’ll mix the two and see what happens? If anyone has any suggestions or experience around this please help!! I’m doing a chocolate fondant covered cake for the weekend and it’s not going well so far!!, please help, thanks:)
Earlene Moore used to mix vanilla and chocolate fondant all the time when she was baking for the public; she was using Bakel’s Pettinice brand, but I don’t see why it wouldn’t work mixing a commercial brand with your homemade fondant. Be careful from a color perspective; you could end up with a much paler cafe au lait color than you were expecting so start by adding some white to the chocolate and see how it goes.
What kind of problem are you having with the chocolate fondant? Is too firm to roll out well? Or cracking a lot?
You could mix Pettinice chocolate fondant with your home-made fondant to make it more workable. That would prevent the color from becoming too pale and the chocolate flavour from becoming too weak.
@ Jeanne,
Thank you:) I did try to mix my home made plain fondant (vanilla), with Rose’s chocolate fondant recipe adn it just continued to crack adn tear. I didn’t have too much trouble with rolling it out though, that part I got okay. Now I’ve bought satin ice chocolate to use for my cake, really hope it works well adn tastes okay too, I am kinda worried but because I have no other chocolate fondant recipes I’m stuck doing it this way:( I will try the pettinice you mentioned next time, thanks again:)
Hi Singbaker,
I’m going to try the pettinice next time, would you happen to know what stores carry it? I think after this second trial of this chocolate fondant recipe I’m going to give up trying to make chocolate fondant until I get my hands on something fool-proof! Thanks for your time:)
