How do you avoid white chocolate seizing?
One of my favorite cookies is a butter cookie rolled very thin and decorated with colored white chocolate. But almost every time I add the food coloring to the white chocolate it seizes. I've had a couple of successes in the past, but more often failures. I've tried everything from adding butter and melting the chocolate with the food coloring to trying different brands of white chocolate. Anyone a white chocolate expert? I'd love some help so I can make some fun cookies for easter.
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You should be able to find them in a candy/chocolate shop, or online.
Good luck!
https://www.santabarbarachocolate.com/easy-chocolate-tempering/
Anyway, butter contains water; shortening and oil don't. If you want to thin out the chocolate, use shortening if you want it to harden, oil if you want it to be a bit malleable.
There are tons of reputable online resources for powdered, oil-based and paste food colorings if you don't have a baker's/confectioner/s supply store near you. Sugarcraft.com is one that I use regularly.
If your chocolate does seize, you can magically return it to a fluid state by adding more liquid. Add boiling water, 1 teaspoon at a time, and stir vigorously after each addition until the chocolate is smooth and of a good consistency for drizzling.
And instead of adding the coloring to the already-melted chocolate, try adding the coloring at the very beginning, before the chocolate begins to melt, to get the cocoa and sugar particles wet. This way, the chocolate doesn't suffer a shock to its system.
Chances are good that if you used real white chocolate and melted it too high and too fast, it seized on its own accord even before you added the food coloring. The fake stuff is less finicky and melts smoother and creamier than the real deal. (Another plus: Because it has less cocoa butter, the imitation stuff has a longer shelf life.) Try using Guittard's Choc-Au-Lait White Chips or Ghirardelli Premium Classic White Baking Chips.
If you insist on using premium white chocolate, melt it very slowly on low heat, monitoring and stirring it constantly, so that it doesn't seize and become grainy.
If it does seize, all is not lost.