Cocoa butter

Beurre de cacao

What it is

Van Houten built his press in 1828 to obtain cocoa powder; the fat that came out was the by-product, and it took another fifteen years before anyone thought to put it back and make chocolate you could bite. It sets in six different crystal forms and only one of them, the fifth, gives gloss and a snap.

In the kitchen

Melt it no higher than 45 °C, take it down to about 27 °C, then bring it back to 31–32 °C before use; skip that and it sets dull and greys over within a day. A spoonful thinned into melted chocolate makes it flow for coating without sweetening it.

Goes with

Dark chocolate Cocoa nibs Vanilla Hazelnut Pistachio Coffee

Same species

Blond chocolate Cocoa mass Cacao pulp Cocoa bean husk Cocoa nibs Dutch-process cocoa powder

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