Making a chocolate sculpture

In preparation for my recent chocolate event I knew that I wanted two show pieces - one that showed off my talent, and one that showed off local artists. I put the word out for any artists working in cast sculptures and found Jay Scott. He does some really beautiful casted work including the faces that I used on my Cake of a Thousand Faces.

For this centerpiece he loaned me a silicone formed mold of a female bust with long flowing hair. I didn't have the time or chocolate to do a trial run so I just started my tempering. I poured about two pounds of dark chocolate into the mold then swished it around a few times, let it rest for 30 seconds each time, re-swish, re-rest...a process of about ten minutes.

After ten minutes I poured out the excess and let the sculpture rest overnight. The next morning I very carefully removed the plaster cast from the silicone.

And then even more carefully removed the silicone mold from the chocolate. This was incredibly nerve racking!

Knowing my chocolate was in perfect temper and believing that the mold was at a good room temp, the lack of sheen was, at first, disappointing. But, the more I looked at it the more I liked it. The dusty finish looked like terra cotta. I opted to leave it as is and am very glad I did.

After the event I crushed her up and put her into brownies :)