Q&A: Can I Use Cooking Oil and Cocoa Powder to Make Chocolate?

Here's a question I recently received from a reader, "Can I use any cooking oil as a substitute for making chocolate bars from cocoa powder?"

Answer

Cocoa powder is created from cacao beans by pressing out the cocoa butter (fat) and leaving the cocoa solids. Doing the reverse, taking cocoa powder and adding cocoa butter back in, is called Reconstituting.

Making chocolate bars from reconstituted ingredients works best with the original parts: cocoa powder plus cocoa butter.

Substituting with another fat system (such as cooking oil) is tricky, and you can't call it CHOCOLATE (Couverture). Instead you have to call it CHOCOLATE FLAVORED or CONFECTIONERY COATING or Candy Coating.

Not all cooking oils will even work as a substitute, but some can if the melt point and stability are calculated correctly.

Remember that chocolate is a solid at room temperature, and you would like it to melt in your mouth so that it doesn't feel waxy. Any substitute oil should behave the same way.

Got a chocolate question you'd like me to answer here? Visit the Meet Your Instructor page and ask!

Bryn Kirk

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