Cocoa butter is a creamy, hard natural vegetable oil extracted from cocoa liquor. It has a light chocolate taste and aroma and is one of the ingredients for making chocolate. So what is the composition of cocoa butter? Take a look below.
In addition to its strong and beautiful unique aroma, cocoa butter also has a fairly firm and brittle character below 15°C. Cocoa butter melts quickly in the mouth and doesn’t feel greasy at all. Cocoa butter is an ideal special oil for chocolate. It has almost all the advantages of various vegetable oils, and no other fats have been found to be comparable to it.
Composition of Cocoa Butter:
Cocoa butter is mainly composed of 98% triglycerides, 1% free fatty acids, 0.3% diglycerides, 0.2% monoglycerides, 150mg/kg~250mg/kg tocopherols and 0.05%~0.13% phospholipids. Among them, triglycerides are the main components of cocoa butter.
Features of Cocoa Butter:
- Cocoa butter is a kind of fat that has both hardness and dissolves quickly. Below 27°C, almost all are solid (27.7°C begins to melt). It will melt rapidly with the increase of temperature, and it will melt completely at 35℃.
Glycerides in cocoa butter coexist in multiple types, resulting in the formation of polycrystalline properties. The melting point of cocoa butter depends on its crystal form.
The tempering process in chocolate processing is the process of allowing the cocoa butter melt to form a stable cocoa butter crystal structure as it cools. Cocoa butter has α, γ, β’, and β crystals with melting points of 17, 23, 26, and 35–37 °C, respectively. Only the beta crystals with the highest melting point are usually used to make chocolate, because a single crystal structure gives the chocolate a smooth texture.
- Cocoa butter is the most stable cooking oil known. It contains natural antioxidants that prevent spoilage and can be stored for 2 to 5 years, making it usable for uses other than food.
- Adding an appropriate amount of cocoa butter to chocolate with low cocoa butter content can improve the melt consistency of the chocolate. Moreover, it can also enhance the bright effect of chocolate after molding and demoulding, and make it delicate in texture.
Natural vs Deodorized Cocoa Butter
Cocoa butter is divided into natural cocoa butter and deodorized cocoa butter according to different production processes.
Natural cocoa butter is light yellow and has natural cocoa aroma; deodorized cocoa butter is based on natural cocoa butter to remove impurities, color, and odor in cocoa butter by physical methods. Deodorized cocoa butter is bright lemon yellow and has no odor.
Natural cocoa butter is widely used in chocolate, cake and other food production; deodorized cocoa butter is generally used in the production of high-end cosmetics, pharmaceutical production, and rarely used in food production.