Let me just start off by saying if this doesn't have enough information in it then this totally isn't a recipe thread, Mods.
This subs been good for me and has provided a ton of information. Perhaps this is a post more for people new to mixing but I want to share with you the way I develop a basic flavour and pushing into a more complex mix.
I saw Coconut and Caramel pair well here so after developing a flavour I thought I'd share the process with you all.
So this is how I make my 1ml samples, I use a shot glass for this but any small container would work. 1 drop of a flavouring concentrate counts as 2% (each drop is approximately 0.02ml) here so potent flavourings should be kept until the end or diluted first.
First Mix:
- 7 drops FA Coconut
- 2 drops FA Caramel
- 1 drop Sweet Guava
I then add 0.9ml of VG (20% total flavouring, 0.2ml, 7+2+1 drops), if you're like me you have a ton of 1ml syringes lying around. These are perfect for this kinda thing. If the flavouring is too intense here increase the amount of VG. Here using 1.8ml of VG gives 10% flavouring which I find is near perfect.
After seeing that guava pairs well with coconut I thought I'd give it a try. I also gave TFA Guava at a 10% dilution at 1 drop again, neither of them worked. Both garbage imo. I included this to show that there's mistakes along the way, make them and learn.
The coconut was solid, the caramel was providing a slight sweetness and turns the coconut creamy.
I mixed 7 drops of Coconut and 2 drops of Caramel just to check how it was without the guava.
So, now we have a solid combination of the coconut and caramel time to add more. What else goes well with these flavours?
- FA Brandy
- FA Apricot
- FA Strawberry
- TFA Bavarian Cream
- FA Catalan Cream
The Apricot and Bavarian cream aren't wanted by me in this mix, maybe they'll be more your thing.
So here's the second mix (technically 3rd)
- 7 drops FA Coconut
- 2 drops FA Caramel
- 2 drops FA Catalan Cream
- 1 drop FA Brandy
- 1 drop FA Strawberry
Coconut's still there and fairly creamy, caramels good. Catalan Cream's pretty decent here, definitelly a keeper. Brandy's providing a slight rubber taste, overflavoured and also isn't sitting well with the cream of the coconut and catalan cream. The Strawberry's also overpowering. Here's the limitation of the shot glass method, unless you have dilutions of all your stronger flavouring's you'll need to mix 2ml+.
I swapped out FA Brandy for FA Liquid Amber after another quick mix which worked much better. (4th mix)
So onto a bottled mix, over to percentages.
First bottle mix:
- 8% FA Coconut (needed a slight increase)
- 2% FA Caramel
- 2% FA Catalan Cream
- 0.6% FA Liquid Amber
- 0.4% FA Strawberry
At this point I think the recipe's enjoyable
Here's the rest of my notes I got while developing this flavour, hopefully it can serve as a starting point for you to develop this flavour or use what you've read in your own flavours.
Other additions
The Good
- 2% TFA Graham Cracker Crust, it mixes well with the recipe, if ya like it then throw it in
- 0.6% FA Joy, also decent. This came from a dissapointing result with FA Meringue, I feel joy just works a bit better here
- FA Torrone at 1 drop per 10ml works pretty well
The meh
- FA Brandy, used at 0.6%
- FA Meringue at 1%, I didn't feel it. It was a big bump in the sweetness where I was enjoying the slight depth this recipe had going for it from the liquid amber and catalan cream
- FA Jamaican Rum at 0.6%, just doesn't seem to fit here, similar to the brandy but a bit worse
And the failures
- Chocolate Brownie - Holy god damn don't use this. Coconut does not just work with any chocolate. At 1 drop there was nothing else but chocolate brownie
- FW Salted Caramel at 0.4%, am I using this wrong? Perhaps it's just not my thing. Horrendous
- TFA Dragonfruit at 1%, added a slight juiciness to it. Didn't like it, ditched.
- INW Kaktus, juicy feeling doesn't mix well with creams.
Substitutions:
- 0.4% FA Strawberry - 1% TFA Strawberry Ripe, 0.4% Sweet Strawberry (will lose realistic taste), 0.75% TFA Strawberry
- 8% FA Coconut - ?% CAP Coconut, 1% Coconut Extra (I dislike it, some say it works in time), stay away from INW Kokonut here
- FA Catalan Cream - Don't think you're gonna get a good substitute but throw 0.5% Cap Vanilla Custard and 2% Vanilla Swirl for a vanilla cream
Hope you enjoyed this!
> Chocolate Brownie - Holy god damn don't use this. Coconut does not just work with any chocolate. At 1 drop there was nothing else but chocolate brownie
Right on- I went home with a free bottle of "Coconut Chocolate Macaroon" that was pretty decent after initial mix. After a week it was crazy different, and pretty crazy bad.
There are approx 10-20 drops in a ml, your calculations assume there are 100 drops in a ml(!) Have you measured your total volume with your syringe after adding flavoring?
You can drip your drops into a syringe with no plunger installed as a quick way to measure too, it wont freely flow out the bottom until you insert the plunger and you can use them as a 1ml graduated cylinder.
Obviously, the smaller the volume, the more difficult it is to be accurate in measurement. Unless you are using a mechanical pipette of some sort, youll see variance in drop size as much as a HUNDRED percent per drop(!) Using drops even to make 100ml solution accurately still has a ridiculous margin of error that could be very hard to duplicate.
I know you are thinking "yeah yeah I know, but its close enough, im just testing" But when you Calculate the margin of error, Your first example could have a flavor content of between 25%-75% of total volume! Its a very big deal!
Although it varies from concentrate to concentrate, a single drop seems about 0.02ml, higher VG flavourings about 0.025-0.03, pure VG about 0.035.
It's definitely a limitation and I only use this technique at the start of a recipe to get the ideas flowing as quickly as possible.
Those numbers (50 drops/ml, 30 drops/ml) are off by 100%-300% from the numbers you used in your post!
OP I have a question for you I was wondering, why not INW Kokonut? I just ordered a bottle the other night and am curious as to why it would not work in your formula?, while some other brands would? What do you believe to be the difference between INW and FA Coconut?
INW kokonut is a pretty decent flavour but it's a very juicy flavour. I use it at ~1%, usually 0.4-0.6% to heavily boost fruit mixes. Not a huge fan of it as the main coconut note.
FA's is just a very solid full coconut flavour that can work in fruit mixes if boosted with INW Kokonut or give a creamy aspect with Caramel and such like I've done in this recipe. It's just more versatile. I think someone mentioned FLV or INW have a better coconut? Or perhaps it was LA, FA's good for me for now.
Capellas is alright also but just not my preference but could work in this recipe.
Ahh okay I gotcha here.. Sounds like I may have picked the wrong coconut. I'm big on fruit&cream blends. I'll have to try out FA's sometime. I'm trying to maintain brand loyalty and at the moment I'm working primarily with Flavor West, and Inawera.
I love FA, honestly if I could restart and build my flavour collection again I'd go for at least 50% FA. I'd probably have some TFA and CAP with a few essential INW and FW flavours.
I just find their flavours are consistently close to the real world flavour and usually pretty potent so less re-stocking. It also feels way closer to cooking when it comes to combining flavours with them than with other companies.
Is 8% FA Coconut for real?
I just recently bought some, haven't used it yet - but my research points more to like 2% in a mix, and like 4-5% alone.
Honestly yes. Unless my taste buds are shot and I can't detect coconut flavourings I use it between 4-10%. Standalone 10-12%. Have you tried it at 8% before?
Fair enough.
In my first comment I said I haven't used it yet - just recently bought it and have been researching recipes using it. I literally haven't seen one that used it >2%.
That's how I normally gauge starting flavoring %'s, so seeing this @ 4x the highest I've seen so far just kind of threw me for a loop.
Oh so you did. I was like you when I first got it and never used it over 2% from fear of overflavouring. After getting no use for a month or so I thought I might as well bump it up higher and see how it handles it which is where I found the 7-10%. Play around with it when you get it, I might just have a poor response to it.