Innovative Use of Strawberry Jam in Compound Praline Chocolate: A Study of Its Physical Properties

As chocolate demand rises, product innovation continues to grow. The use of compound chocolate for praline with water-based fillings remains underexplored, as most studies use couverture chocolate in high-consumption regions like Europe and America. Since compound chocolate often contains low cocoa solids, resulting in a sweeter, milkier taste, this study adds cocoa powder to enhance cocoa flavour intensity. The impact of cocoa powder addition on key physical attributes - melting point, hardness, particle size, and colour - is the focus of this research. This study aimed to develop compound chocolate praline with a strong cocoa flavour intensity by adding cocoa powder. Three proportions of cocoa powder (10%, 20%, 30%) and strawberry jam were used. Chocolate characteristics were tested on the day of 0, 4, 8, and 12. The result showed that the cocoa powder proportions influenced the chocolate colour, moisture content, melting point and hardness. Chocolate lightness with a higher percentage of cocoa powder was darker than that of the ones with lower percentages. Whereas, regardless of the types of chocolate, moisture content, chocolate hardness and melting point tended to increase as the proportion of cocoa powder increased.