Review of Felchlin Ultra Gloss Dark Chocolate

If you want your chocolate candies to have a smooth, shiny finish and a hard snap, you have a few options: temper real chocolate, or use chocolate-flavored candy coating. Tempering chocolate makes a tasty product with a great finish, but requires special equipment and is not always consistent. Chocolate-flavored candy coating is the easier option, but the coating often tastes terribly artificial.

Felchlin’s Ultra Gloss Dark Chocolate is a molding chocolate designed to be an alternative to tempered chocolate. This product consistently produces smooth, shiny chocolates that have an authentic dark chocolate taste.

The Benefits of Using Felchlin Ultra Gloss Dark Chocolate

Felchlin Ultra Gloss Dark Chocolate is the best molding chocolate I have ever worked with. Like other chocolate-flavored coatings, it contains hydrogenated oils instead of cocoa butter, but unlike those other coatings, this one actually tastes good! In a side-by-side comparison it won’t be mistaken for real chocolate, but compared to most of the competition, it has a deep, rich chocolate taste that comes from good-quality cocoa powder. It’s nice as a coating but also as a stand-alone candy.

The main benefit of Felchlin Ultra Gloss is convenience. This chocolate will produce perfectly even results without the need for tempering. All you have to do is chop it and melt it, and it is ready for dipping. The chocolate hardens to a thin layer and has a smooth satin gloss. It does not need to be refrigerated to set, and holds up well in higher temperatures (although if it is hot, it will get soft and eventually melt in extreme heat).

I recommend Felchlin Ultra Gloss for dipping truffles, molding small chocolates, drizzling and writing on pastries, creating three-dimensional accent pieces, and creating chocolate curls and decorations. If you are making gourmet candies with an emphasis on quality and taste, you probably want to stick to real chocolate, but if you are interested in convenience and a beautiful appearance, I highly recommend Felchlin Ultra Gloss Dark Chocolate.

The Drawbacks of Using Felchlin Ultra Gloss Dark Chocolate

As much as I love this product, there are some drawbacks I should mention. First of all, Felchlin chocolate is not inexpensive. I buy it from a local store and pay upwards of $8/pound. While there are certainly gourmet chocolates that cost this much or more, it tends to be more expensive than other non-chocolate “molding” products, and you may not want to pay this much money for a chocolate substitute. It can also be hard to find. I have a local supplier, but depending on your location, you may have to buy it online, which might reduce the price but incur shipping fees.

Secondly, if you are used to dipping your candies in genuine chocolate, you might not like the texture of Felchlin. Like other molding chocolates that are based on hydrogenated oils, this one contains “hardened palm kernel oil” and tends to coat your mouth in a way that real chocolate, with real cocoa butter, does not. Additionally, if you are trying to reduce or eliminated hydrogenated fats from your diet, this product may not suit your dietary needs.

Final Thoughts

Felchlin Ultra Gloss will never be mistaken for “real” chocolate, but in my opinion, it’s a good product that tastes great and performs beautifully. Felchlin also offers a white molding chocolate that has many of the same properties—it’s easy for dipping, and hardens to a smooth, shiny finish. I don’t like the taste as much, so I only use it for accent work, but it might suit your needs if you are looking for a nice white molding chocolate.