The technique used to blend uncooked
eggs into hot liquid or sauce. Eggs are beaten and a little of the hot mixture
is stirred into them to warm (temper) them.
Tempering slowly raises the temperature of an egg, without curdling it and
without heating it through conventional methods. This prevents the eggs
from scrambling or the milk from curdling when the hot liquid is
introduced. Tempering is also done when trying to add a cold ingredient to
melted
chocolate or butter.
NOTE: You can also
temper chocolate, but it is a different
process.
To temper:
- Heat the milk,
usually until just boiling. I like to let my ingredients cool slightly. Make
sure they are still fluid and not too thick. If not, reheat.
- Prepare the eggs by
lightly beating to combine; the hot liquids will eventually be added to them.
- First dribble a small
amount of hot milk in a steady stream into the eggs while quickly whisking the
two together. This raises the temperature of the egg gradually and cools the
milk slightly.
- Continue to dribble in the hot milk and whisk until you
feel, with your hand, that the bowl's side or bottom has become warm or as
close as possible to the liquid's temperature. Doing this is a good indicator
of telling if the egg has been warmed up.
- Either, continue to add the rest of the
hot liquids in a steady stream to the eggs while whisking or return the egg
mixture back to the rest of the hot milk. The eggs won't scramble or the milk
won't curdle at this point, because they have been warmed gently.
But, always keep the mixture moving - don't stop whisking.
- Proceed with the recipe.
NOTE: If you see any small
white clumps in the mixture, then the egg has gone into shock and has curdled,
either because the egg was too cold, or the mixing was done too slow. The egg
has cooked and has separated from the hot mixture and therefore you have to
start all over again with new ingredients. Sometimes the small white clumps can
come from the chalazae from the egg whites and all you have to do is simply
strain the custard.
Question:
I melted white chocolate in the microwave
as I was making a white chocolate raspberry cheesecake. When I went to put it in
the batter the chocolate had hardened. I microwaved it some more and put it in
the batter, but there were some hard white chocolate pieces in the batter that I
had to remove. What did I do wrong?
Answer
