Hands On With Valrhona’s New App For Pastry & Baking Pros

For over thirty years, the expert pastry chefs at Valrhona have perfected their Valrhona Essentials, a growing collection of 165 recipes and guides created to inspire and assist chefs and bakers in building their own customized desserts. Now, all of that development and knowledge are available at one’s fingertips with the new Valrhona app. With a few clicks, chefs have access to not only the Valrhona Essentials collection but a whole host of other recipes, helpful tools, videos and of course, product information.

One of the most convenient features in the Valrhona Essentials recipe assortment is that the app will do conversions: ounces to grams or vice versa and recipe size by weight, all updated to the user’s preference with one click. Many recipes are also customizable to the type of chocolate the chef wants or needs from the Valrhona collection. Upon selecting the chocolate, the app immediately converts the recipe for its unique characteristics. It takes the guesswork out of adjusting a recipe and sets a chef up for success, saving time and avoiding costly mistakes, which is vital to a professional kitchen. Imagine having 14 different ice cream variations or over 30 different versions of chocolate chantilly mousse available in one click! They also offer convenient tips for each recipe like suggested storage temperature and whether a recipe is freezable for future use.

The recipe offerings on the app aren’t just limited to their Essentials collection. There is an extensive recipe collection, covering everything from bonbons to viennoiserie and even beverages. An app user can mark recipes as favorites, allowing for easy sorting in future visits. For more complex recipes such as entremets and plated desserts, each recipe step is listed at the bottom of the screen, so a chef can skip to the part of the recipe that is needed without having to endlessly scroll. There are also exclusive recipes available to Cercle V members, which are marked accordingly (and thankfully, if you aren’t already a member of Cercle V, the app provides information about this program and how to sign up).

There are other invaluable “Tools of the Trade” on the app, even for chefs who may not consistently use Valrhona or their recipes. There are separate conversion tools for weight and temperature, so any recipe, regardless of where it’s from, can easily be converted. The video tutorials offer a range of subjects from basic tempering to ganache to molding, all excellent sources for chefs who want to learn or brush up on a chocolate technique. And what chef doesn’t want a seemingly endless source of inspiration? The Flavor & Chocolate Pairings section allows a chef to research ideas by either the type of chocolate or a flavor combination. There are over 30 Valrhona products and 80 different flavors to pair, ranging from wines like cabernet sauvignon to fruits such as the kumquat and even spices like Sarawak pepper. Once the selection is made, the app provides suggested pairings for both chocolates and other flavors, letting the chef decide whether to experiment on his or her own or dive right in using one of the suggested recipes available on the app.

Of course, for those fully immersed in the world of Valrhona, this app is a one-stop-shop for everything they need. Tempering and fluidity charts for each product are available, as well as full detailed descriptions and technical information. It wouldn’t be Valrhona without new top-of-the-line product offerings to entice creativity in the kitchen. The Featured Products section allows chefs to browse the latest and greatest offerings, like the new Inspiration collection – products that have the same creamy texture as chocolate but are made with different all-natural flavors such as almond, strawberry and yuzu. The app provides an up-to-date calendar of classes and events and easy access to all the Valrhona social media platforms to stay connected. And finally, if the extensive, detailed information on the app isn’t enough, a sales representative is available to contact with one click in the app as well.

The Valrhona app is available for free on any IOS device and is coming soon to Android. Now in the palm of a chef’s hand, there is one convenient place to access all of Valrhona’s expertise, research and fine assortment. All you have to do is click to download.