Chocolate Notes Ill — Tempering

Tempering became my first lesson.

The process fascinated me, and I realised that chocolate demands a specific kind of attention. It asks you to slow down, and it refuses shortcuts. Too hot, and it loses its structure. Too cold, and it becomes stubborn and dull. The work requires patience, observation, and a willingness to wait for the right moment.

As I learned to temper chocolate, I began noticing how this practice echoed something in my experience of mothering.

There are moments in parenting when emotions arrive at full intensity: arguments, frustrations, sudden outbursts. In those moments, I often want an immediate resolution. But tempering taught me another possibility. Not suppression or control but rather a careful modulation of energy. It's a process of listening and allowing something to cool, settle, and reorganise itself before taking shape again.

Chocolate became my material teacher.

I still haven’t taken any chocolate classes.

When people ask where I learned, I find it difficult to answer.

Mostly, I learned alone by watching videos and reading research papers on cocoa butter crystallisation, and joined an online chocolate bonbon group and through countless trials, failures, and adjustments.

I also ate a lot of chocolate. I compare the snaps, melts, textures, finishes, aroma, design, concept…

Sometimes the fat starts to migrate and the chocolate blooms, like the “chocolate room” by Edward Ruscha, Sometimes it refuses to release from the mould…

I don’t think I was trying to master a craft.

I think I was trying to stay inside a process of not knowing.

Because if I went to a class, I would probably learn faster. There are correct temperatures, correct methods, and correct outcomes. Somehow, I want something slower than knowledge.