Trendspotters from the 2015 Summer Fancy Food Show identified popular flavor profiles that just might tantalize your taste buds and inspire ideas for your own new product development.

Flower Power

Floral notes such as rose, lavender and hibiscus made a memorable appearance in products such as Belvoir Fruit Farms Elderflower & Rose Lemonade, Masala Pop Saffron Rose Popcorn, Rogue Creamery La-Di-Da Lavender Cheese and Vosges Haut-Chocolat Blood Orange Hibiscus Caramel Marshmallows.

 

Vosges Haut-Chocolatcovers marshmallows in burnt sugar caramel with blood oranges and hibiscus flavors, chocolate and tops it with black salt.

 

 

Cocktail Culture

Spirits, wine, and beer inspire flavors and ingredient pairings like Bissell Maple Farm's Pappy & Company Bourbon Barrel-Aged Syrup, Brooklyn Brine Co. Hop-Pickles, Colonel Pabst All Malt Amber-Lager Worcestershire Sauce and L.A. Creamery The Manhattan.

L.A. Creamery’s The Manhattantakes its cues from the classic cocktail with Rittenhouse Rye, brown butter toffee and bing cherries.

 

 

Go Ginger

An honorable mention, so to speak, goes to ginger as another hot flavor trend (pun intended) for 2015.

Try the classic pairing of crystallized ginger dipped in dark chocolate or more adventurous pairings incorporated inDivineChocolate’sLemon Infused Ginger Turtles (top)or Coconut Ginger Popcorn Truffles fromYoderPopcornClick here to view the recipe from Yoder Popcorn.

Tags:  Candy Making  Caramel  Chocolate  Flavors  Floral  Ginger  Ice Cream  Lemon  Liquor  Marshmallow  New  Photos  Popcorn  Recipe  Trends 

This week’s quick tip? Check your temper!

 

While we don’t want you to have a temper tantrum during the peak of the holiday season, we’re actually referring to checking the temper of your chocolate. As production aims to keep up with the demands of the holidays, it may be easy for production staff to get sidetracked and assume your chocolate is well-tempered and ready to move into the assembly line. However, not keeping a close eye on your chocolate’s temper is a costly mistake.

 

Many of our candy making members have a system in place to verify their chocolate’s temper every hour. While verification processes may vary, just be sure that you have a process in place, even if it is a simple pen and paper system.

 

How often do you check your temper? Leave us a comment below!

Tags:  Candy Making  Chocolate  GMP's  Quality Control 

It is almost the season for making life-size chocolate Santas. Ok, we realize they aren’t really life-size but some of the pretty large ones could definitely be life-size for a child!

 

Either way, this week on the blog we have a small but useful tip to help you evenly distribute the chocolate in your life-size moulded Santa Claus. Since these huge moulds aren’t likely to fit on a mould spinner, most candy makers seem to have a special way of spinning and flipping the moulds to be sure the chocolate doesn’t all gather on one side as it hardens. To help with this process our tip is to make a rule for your staff that each time they walk by the mould they need to flip it.

 

Be sure every staff member knows and understands the reason for this rule is to evenly spread the chocolate inside the mould to help ensure they’ll follow it. Additionally, it would be wise to assign a staff member to be in charge of ensuring the mould is flipped on a regular schedule. For example, if it needs to be flipped every five minutes and no one walks by for 10 minutes, this staff person would be the one to flip it at the five minute mark. It would probably be helpful to have a pen and paper chart nearby for staff to initial and write the time when they flip the mould.

 

By involving all staff to flip your extra large moulds you’ll be creating a team environment where everyone pitches in, in addition to adding an element of quality control,  

 

P.S. This tip came from our Mechanics of Chocolate Moulding education course held last fall. Attend RCI’s next education course, Chocolate Boot Camp®, by registering online today at retailconfectioners.org/bootcamp.

Tags:  Candy Making  Chocolate  Holidays  Moulds  Quality Control  Seasonal 

Tasting Tray from RCI's Chocolate Boot Camp

As you know, quality control requires that you taste test your products, including the chocolate ingredients you use. Therefore, today’s tip is a quick one that will help you get the most accurate flavor when doing a chocolate tasting.

 

The tip? Use room temperature water to cleanse your palate between tastings rather than cold water. Because cold hardens the fats in your mouth it affects tasting. However, room temperature water is one way to help ensure that you taste the full and accurate flavor of the chocolate.

P.S. Today’s tip was from RCI’s Chocolate Boot Camp education course. Registration for our 2015 session recently opened online. Visit retailconfectioners.org/bootcamp for more information.

Tags:  Candy Making  Chocolate  GMP's  Quality Control 

This week’s tip is a quick and fun product idea that many candy stores have found to be quite popular. It is chocolate party spoons! Just take plastic or wooden spoons, dip them in chocolate a few times to create a nice, thick coating and then decorate them with embellishments, sprinkles, etc. You could also fill the inside of the spoon with chocolate instead of just dipping it. We’ve also seen these items marketed as coffee spoons, with stores encouraging customers to stir them into their coffee for an indulgent chocolate flavor. Plus, it's a fun way to flavor hot drinks by infusing the chocolate spoon with flavors such as cinnamon, peppermint, hazelnut and more.

 

Need a visual? We found a few photos on Pinterest to help inspire you!

P.S. This week RCI is hosting our Fall Regional Conference in Las Vegas. Check out photos from the event on the RCI Facebook page!

Tags:  Candy Making  Creativity  Merchandising  Photos