Chocolate Dessert Ideas

Melting chocolate is one of the easiest ways to incorporate chocolate into your desserts and treats. From chocolate covered strawberries, chocolate swirled meringues and more, there is a lot of fun to be had when choosing what you would like to create.

There is not much to consider when melting chocolate either, but there are some fundamental steps to the success of achieving chocolate that is superbly glossy and silky. To melt chocolate successfully, your chocolate bar should contain a minimum of 35% chocolate solids. The higher the solids, the richer the chocolate flavour. Chocolate solids are the building blocks that help melt the chocolate at a consistent level, giving you that shiny look.

Traditionally, you would need to melt chocolate over a bain-marie, carefully steaming the chocolate until it melts. Siemens hobs with induction technology enable precise temperature control, ideal for melting chocolate at home.

Place your chocolate straight into a small saucepan and leave it on level 1 on your induction hob to gently melt. There is no need for a bowl with hot water as there is constant control of the heating settings through the induction. However, results may vary depending on the type of pan you use. For effortless results, we recommend the lesser known warming drawers. See more about our warming drawers here

Place chocolate squares into a glass bowl and use the level 2 setting in your warming drawer. This will gently melt the chocolate at a steady rate, leaving no room for error in over-heating the chocolate and turning it into a mess.

In addition, the warming drawer gives you the added flexibility to be able to melt milk, dark and white chocolate all at the same time, the warming drawer is the perfect space to cater for this. This is especially useful if you like to craft homemade chocolate gifts.

It is also an easy way to produce a chocolate sauce or fondue for dipping strawberries and marshmallows. Experiment with your favourite chocolate bars, like a Toblerone, that has chewy pieces of nougat throughout that will give you that extra crunch.

The great thing about melting chocolate in the warming drawer is that you can leave the warming drawer on. If your chocolate starts to set, just return to the drawer for a few moments to warm it up once more.

It is an easy way to produce ganache too. As the chocolate is melted with the cream in the warming drawer there is a better precision over the temperatures, which means you will not split the ganache due to cold and warm ingredients being combined.

Tempering chocolate is something we would all love to master in chocolate making and the warming drawer takes that stress away.

Tempering chocolate is a process professional chefs and chocolatiers use to achieve the really high gloss finish to their chocolate desserts. It requires patience and time.

Firstly, using the warming drawer on level 2, place 60% of the chocolate you are using into a glass bowl and allow it to melt. Meanwhile grate the remaining chocolate finely by hand or kitchen machine. Be sure to keep this cool as it may affect the results.

Once the chocolate in the bowl has melted completely, turn the drawer down to level 1, add the grated chocolate, and return to the drawer. Stir frequently and allow to sit in the drawer for a further 15 minutes. It is the combination of melted and solid chocolate at this stage which gives you the higher sheen.

This should achieve the glossy finish, which could now be used to line Easter egg or chocolate moulds or cup cake cases. If you are feeling extra adventurous, spread your chocolate onto a marble slab and allow it to set softly. Then using a sharp knife, glide it through the chocolate to create chocolate curls.

It is worth mentioning that white chocolate will not temper readily due to its lower chocolate solids, which is why it is fundamental to check your cocoa solids content when choosing what chocolate to temper with.