Ice cream is one of the most famous desserts in the world. It is a beautiful mixture made with protein, fat and sugar.
I have written this blog to share with you why we use cocoa butter in our ice cream. At Giapo, we want to deliver the best product possible and push the boundaries when it comes to ice cream. That’s why we continually experiment with new ingredients.
As well as being a chef, I am also very interested in the science of food. I recently carried out research to find out what happens when we substitute butter fat with different concentrations of cocoa butter when making ice cream. By using different amounts of cocoa butter, I want to improve the overall quality of my ice cream.
My team and I measured the resulting flavour, texture, viscosity (thickness), feeling in the mouth, appearance and melting rate of each ice cream. What we found is that using more cocoa butter resulted in an ice cream that took longer to melt, had a better texture and tasted more amazing.
Introduction
Cocoa butter is a pale-yellow, edible, all-natural vegetable fat, which is extracted from the cocoa bean. It melts smoothly and rapidly in the mouth and gives a cooling effect without leaving a greasy impression on the palate. It contains only three major fatty acids: palmitic acid (26%), stearic acid (34.5%) and oleic acid (34.5%). It has already been confirmed that oleic acid is good for our health and research shows that although cocoa butter has a high content of saturated fat, it does not elevate blood cholesterol to the same extent as other saturated fats (Sabariah, Md. Ali, & Chong, 1998). This is due to its high content of stearic acid, which can reduce cholesterol in the blood. Also, cocoa butter canexist in more than one form orcrystalstructure (polymorphic), like alpha, beta, and gamma, as well as beta crystals. These each have diverse melting points ranging from 17.3 – 37°C. The major form we use in food is its beta form (Metin, 1997) because this is the crystal we seek to develop when crystallising the chocolate.
Another wonderful characteristic of cocoa butter is that it can be combined with other fats, such as milk fat, without greatly affecting its melting properties. And this is where I got the idea to substitute some of our butter fat with this valuable product.
Research shows when fats of different composition are mixed, the melting point of the blend is lower than that of the individual components. Pure butter fat (obtained in the same method used to produce ghee) is a mixture of triglyceride, which has more than one molecular formula. As it is still water in oil emulsion, its high content of saturated fatty acids leaves people with an oily feeling in the mouth. Compared with cocoa butter, ghee contains less unsaturated fatty acid and more saturated fatty acid. Coultate reported in 2002 that the average carbon chain length (carbon atoms) of cocoa butter is longer than the cow’s ghee, and that it contains more unsaturated fatty acid. Since 97% of the composition of ghee is milk fat, it is thought to be an effective bloom inhibitor for chocolate (Coultate 2002).
Overall, we found clear evidence that cocoa butter is an excellent ingredient to use in ice cream. We hope you read on and enjoy learning the details of how we did this experiment!
Experiment Procedure
Ice cream preparation
Ingredients: milk, cream, purified butter fat (ghee), cocoa butter, milk powder, sugar, dextrose, stabiliser.
The purified butter fat is prepared by melting butter and removing the watery, foamy residue left on top.
Temperature of the ice cream is tested by digital pin-type thermometer.
Step 1: Pour milk and cream in a bowl, prepare the ghee.
Step 2: Mix the powders, sugar, dextrose and stabiliser in a cup.
Step 3: Add the mixture into the bowl.
Step 4: Add the cocoa butter and melt it by microwave oven.
Step 5: Add the ghee and then stir.
Step 6: Stir the mixture and pour liquid nitrogen into the bowl to make ice cream.
Step 7: Taste the four different ice creams (after tasting each sample, rinse and wait 60 seconds so that the tongue is able to continue tasting well during the experiment.)
Ideal tasting temperature: -10.5°C
Actual tasting temperature: -8.5°C to -8.9°C
Result and discussion of this experiment
The recipe used is a standard gelato ice cream recipe: milk 360g (3.5% butter fat), cream 60g (35% butter fat, 21g butterfat), sugar 70g, dextrose 19g, skimmed milk powder 22g, stab ice cream 2.5g.
Total weight = 533.5g
Total fat content = 46.94, or 8.8%
With this experiment we did not increase the total fat content of the recipe.
The table below explains how we have substituted some of the butter fat with some cocoa butter.
Note: CB= cocoa butter, BF = butter fat
| Sample | Texture | Flavour | Rheology | Mouth feeling | Melting rate |
| Control – 100% butter fat | Smooth | Strong butter flavour | Medium flow rate | Greasy | Very fast |
| 0.75% BF and 0.25% CB | No significant difference | Slight butter flavour | No significant different | Slightly greasy | Fast |
| 0.5% BF and 50% CB | No significant difference | Clean | Low flow rate | Clean, not greasy | Fast |
| 1% CB | No significant difference | Clean | Low flow rate | Clean, not greasy | Slow |
During the experiments, we made four ice creams using different compositions of butter fat and cocoa butter. The data shows that the ice cream substituted with 1% cocoa butter a gives cleaner flavour and better mouth feeling. Also, the melting rate was improved (slowed).
Similar results can be found in other journal articles. Prindiville et al. (2000) carried out research into the effect of milk fat, cocoa butter and whey protein fat replacers on the sensory properties of ice cream. They reported that ice cream made with cocoa butter melts more slowly than ice cream containing milk fat or fat replacer.
In my opinion, altering the compositions of butter fat and cocoa butter made no significant differences to the texture – all four ice creams were silky smooth. Also, each of the ice creams had a similar hardness.
In terms of flavour, the ice cream made with 1% cocoa butter had the cleanest flavour. Our data shows that a higher content of butter fat in ice cream results in a stronger butter flavour.
Several researchers have shown that milk fat or another fat replacer can be used as a substitute when making ice creams. However, this can alter both the texture and flavour profile of ice cream. These changes can impart an imbalance in the flavour profile through various mechanisms (Welty, Marshall, Grun, & Ellersieck, 2001).
We also looked at how changing the compositions of butter fat and cocoa butter would affect the four ice creams’ rheology. We found these changes made no significant difference to rheology between the four samples. The samples with different percentages of cocoa butter can all do wire drawing up while the one made of 100% butter fat can not. This phenomenon indicates that ice cream containing cocoa butter has a higher viscosity than the ghee one and results in the formation of some beta crystals. The high viscosity can give a fine mouth feeling and improve the quality of ice cream.
Lastly, the ice cream made with only butter fat gives a stronger sense of greasiness compared to those made with cocoa butter. The composition of fatty acids in butter fat plays a key role in this. The large amount of saturated fatty acid in butter fat makes the product greasy and gives it a buttery flavour.
Conclusion
Overall, our observations show that cocoa butter gives ice cream a clean flavour, better mouth feeling, and a slower melting rate. In contrast, ice cream made with only butter fat has a strong buttery flavour and leaves an oily feeling in the mouth. As I said previously, the cause of this greasy mouth feeling is the high concentration of saturated fatty acid in butter fat. Changing just 1% of the total butter fat in an ice cream recipe can make a substantial difference.
We feel that cocoa butter is a very special ingredient offering unique qualities and values. For this reason, we feel it cannot be substituted in our ice cream recipe. We hope you embrace these findings.
References
Mateljan, G. (2012). What are the advantages and disadvantages of butter and ghee when it comes to cooking? The world’s healthiest foods.
Metin, S. (1997). Crystallization behavior and kinetics of blends of cocoa butter and milk fat or milk fat fractions. (Dissertation/Thesis), ProQuest, UMI Dissertations Publishing. Retrieved from http://aut.summon.serialssolutions.com
Prindiville, E. A., Marshall, R. T., & Heymann, H. (2000). Effect of Milk Fat, Cocoa Butter, and Whey Protein Fat Replacers on the Sensory Properties of Lowfat and Nonfat Chocolate Ice Cream1. Journal of Dairy Science, 83(10), 2216-2223. doi: 10.3168/jds.S0022-0302(00)75105-8
Sabariah, S., Md. Ali, A. R., & Chong, C. L. (1998). Chemical and physical characteristics of cocoa butter substitutes, milk fat and malaysian cocoa butter blends. Journal of the American Oil Chemists’ Society, 75(8), 905-910. doi: 10.1007/s11746-998-0265-7
Srivatsava, P. (2014). Ghee: good or bad? LifePositive.Welty, W. M., Marshall, R. T., Grun, I. U., & Ellersieck, M. R. (2001). Effects of MilkFat, Cocoa Butter, or Selected Fat Replacers on Flavor Volatiles of Chocolate
Ice Cream. Journal of Dairy Science, 84(1), 21.?Wright, C. (2012). Cocoa butter is not just for chocolate anymore – Discover the healthy secrets behind this sensuous food. Natural News.
