EFFECT OF DIFFERENT STORAGE CONDITIONS ON FAT BLOOM FORMATION IN DIFFERENT TYPES OF CHOCOLATE

Chocolate is a product that is mostly composed of cocoa butter, cocoa mass and sugar. Cocoa butter is a sensitive component that is susceptible to changes when temperature fluctuations occur during storage. Moreover, chocolate is sensitive to changes in the humidity of the surrounding environment. At inappropriate temperatures, part of stable crystals of cocoa butter will melt, fat will come out on the surface of chocolate and fat bloom will appear. This phenomenon is one of the most common problems in the chocolate industry since it highly affects consumers’ acceptability – grey layer on the surface will make consumers dislike the product and ones that are less familiar with the phenomenon will question the safety. In this research, chocolates with different contents of cocoa butter, milk fat and substitute fats were prepared. We examined the effects of different humidity (50, 65 and 75%) and temperatures (20 and 29 °C) during storage on the formation of fat bloom. Measurements of surface colour and thermophysical properties of the surface of chocolate were performed. Chocolates with higher content of milk fat proved to be the most stable. Chocolate containing only cocoa butter was also stable under different storage conditions. The substitute fat and high humidity additives have had a great impact on formation of fat bloom on surface of chocolate