What Chocolate Is Best for Chocolate Covered Strawberries?

Short answer: the best chocolate for chocolate covered strawberries is a real chocolate, ideally a couverture, melted and tempered. Couverture carries at least 31% cocoa butter by the Codex Alimentarius standard, so it flows into a thin, even coat, and tempering is what gives the shell its shine, snap and resistance to bloom. Dark, milk or white is a matter of taste: the method is the same, only the working temperature changes.

Quick answer: what to buy

Your need	Product	Price
A dark couverture for regular production	Bassan Sur del Lago 71%, 5 kg bag	$273.00 CAD
A 55% dark for coating, by the box	FCH 55% dark chocolate minibars, 10 kg	$299.00 CAD
Small batches at home	Organic dark chocolate chips 70%, 1 kg	$45.95 CAD
Dipping tools	Martellato dipping fork set, 10 pieces	$69.50 CAD
Coloured drizzles on white chocolate	Pavoni Chocolart red fat-soluble powder, 40 g	$46.99 CAD

Why couverture works best for dipping strawberries

Couverture has more cocoa butter than ordinary chocolate, and cocoa butter is the fat that makes melted chocolate flow and then set firm and glossy.

The Codex Alimentarius standard for chocolate (CXS 87-1981) asks for at least 31% cocoa butter in couverture, against at least 18% in chocolate. Canada's compositional standards have no separate couverture category; they set minimum cocoa butter for each type of chocolate:

Chocolate (Canadian standard)	Minimum cocoa butter	Other minimums
Dark, bittersweet or semi-sweet chocolate	18%	35% total cocoa solids
Milk chocolate	15%	25% total cocoa solids, 12% milk solids
White chocolate	20%	14% milk solids

In practice, read the label or technical sheet: a product sold as couverture tells you its working temperatures, and that is what you need at the dipping bowl.

View dark couverture →

Dark, milk or white chocolate for strawberries?

All three work; choose by taste, and set the working temperature for the type you use.

Chocolate	Holding temperature for tempered work*
Dark	31°C (88°F)
Milk	29°C (84°F)
White	28°C (82°F)

*The three programs of Martellato's Digital Meltinchoc melter, which melts at 45°C (113°F) and then holds the chocolate at these temperatures. Your chocolate's own technical sheet comes first.

The two dark chocolates we stock give their own working ranges:

• Bassan Sur del Lago 71%: made in Canada from Venezuelan Trinitario cacao with ancestral Criollo lineage, with notes of fruit, wood and nuts and low acidity. Melt at 50°C (122°F) at most, temper to 30–32°C (86–90°F), use within 4 hours of tempering; fluidity 4 on Bassan's 5-point scale.
• FCH 55%: 100% Venezuelan Trinitario cacao. Melt at 45–50°C (113–122°F), crystallise at 28–29°C (82–84°F), work at 31–32°C (88–90°F). FCH lists coating for fillings among its uses.

For a two-tone finish, dip in dark first, let it set, then drizzle white chocolate on top. To colour the white chocolate, use a fat-soluble colour: Pavoni's Chocolart powders dissolve in cocoa butter and are made for colouring chocolate masses.

Do you need to temper chocolate for strawberries?

Yes, if you want a shiny shell that snaps and stays firm at room temperature.

Tempering takes melted chocolate through a temperature cycle that forms the stable crystals of cocoa butter. Well-tempered chocolate crystallises quickly, contracts and sets with a high gloss and good resistance to fat bloom; under-tempered chocolate often blooms in less than two days, with large white spots or rings (Lonchampt and Hartel, 2004).

Our guide to tempered vs untempered chocolate explains the difference in detail.

Can you use chocolate chips for chocolate covered strawberries?

You can, if the chips are real chocolate that melts smoothly: read the ingredient list rather than going by the word "chips".

Our organic dark chocolate chips 70% list only organic cocoa mass, cane sugar, cocoa butter and cocoa powder, and the product description names coating fruit among their uses and says they melt smoothly for dipping. They suit small batches; for regular production a couverture with a technical sheet makes temperatures easier to repeat. For more on chips, see how to melt chocolate chips for dipping.

How to dip strawberries in chocolate, step by step

1. Wash the strawberries ahead and dry them completely. Melted chocolate cannot tolerate water: even steam or a few drops of condensation can make it seize and turn into a grainy mess (Exploratorium, Science of Cooking). Keep the bowl, spatula and fruit dry.
2. Melt and temper the chocolate following its technical sheet, for example the Bassan or FCH ranges above. Never cover the melting bowl with a lid: condensation drips back into the chocolate.
3. Dip. Hold the strawberry by its leaves, dip it, lift it and let the excess run back into the bowl. A dipping fork helps for strawberries without leaves.
4. Set. Lay the strawberries on parchment or a silicone mat. Bassan's sheet gives 16–18°C (61–64°F) for crystallisation once the chocolate is applied.
5. Decorate while the chocolate is still wet if you want toppings to stick, or after it sets for drizzles.

Should you refrigerate chocolate covered strawberries?

Chocolate itself is better kept out of the fridge: Iowa State University Extension notes that refrigerated chocolate can pick up odours and develop a moist surface when it comes back to room temperature, which leads to bloom.

Strawberries, on the other hand, are fresh fruit. The simplest way to avoid both problems is to plan your dipping close to serving time. Bassan recommends storing its chocolate at 16–20°C (61–68°F) and below 50% relative humidity, which gives you an idea of the room you want to work in.

Keeping chocolate at dipping temperature

For more than a few dozen strawberries, a melter keeps the chocolate at a steady working temperature while you dip, so the coat stays thin from the first berry to the last.

Martellato's Digital Meltinchoc, for example, melts at 45°C (113°F) and then holds dark, milk or white chocolate at 31, 29 or 28°C. Martellato, Mol d'Art and Bilait table-top melters bought from us come with a free spatula. To compare melters and tempering machines, read what chocolate is best for melting.

View chocolate melters →

How AI can help your production

Before a busy day such as Valentine's, weigh the chocolate you use on a test dozen and give that figure to an AI assistant with your order list. Ask it for the total chocolate to temper, a dipping schedule by batch, and a one-page routine for your team with the working temperature, the setting conditions and a line to log the room temperature and humidity.

AI organises the information; tasting and the final decision stay with your chef.

Couverture and dipping tools at Zucchero Canada

We stock Bassan Sur del Lago 71%, made in Canada from Venezuelan cacao, and FCH 55% from Venezuelan Trinitario cacao. Bassan ships across Canada from Calgary. We are an authorized distributor of Martellato and Pavoni Italia, for dipping forks, melters and the Chocolart colours.

• View Bassan Sur del Lago 71% → 5 kg bag $273.00 CAD
• View the Martellato dipping fork set → $69.50 CAD
• View Chocolate by Ramon Morató, 6th edition → $160.00 CAD: 416 pages and 200 recipes, with tempering, coating and glazing techniques.

For edible gold and other finishing touches, browse edible gold and silver. Orders over $500 CAD get 5% off automatically at checkout; chocolate is not part of our free shipping offer, and food products ship within Canada only. Dipping strawberries for a shop, hotel or event company? Contact us for volume quantities, or call 587-774-8873 (toll free 877-741-8251).

Dark couverture | Dipping forks | Chocolate melters | Best chocolate for melting | Melting chips for dipping

This article is for information only. Every business is different: draw your own conclusions based on your own expectations, budget and goals, and talk to qualified experts before you decide or invest.

Sources: Codex Alimentarius, Standard for Chocolate and Chocolate Products CXS 87-1981 (amended 2022); CFIA, Canadian Food Compositional Standards, Volume 4, 4.1.6, 4.1.8 and 4.1.9; Lonchampt P. and Hartel R.W., "Fat bloom in chocolate and compound coatings", European Journal of Lipid Science and Technology 106 (2004) 241–274; Martellato, Digital Meltinchoc handbook of use and maintenance; Exploratorium, Science of Cooking, "Why does my melted chocolate seize up?"; Iowa State University Extension and Outreach, AnswerLine, "Chocolate – Shelf Life, Storage, and Bloom" (2023); Zucchero Canada product data for Bassan Sur del Lago 71%, FCH 55%, organic dark chocolate chips 70%, Pavoni Chocolart fat-soluble powders and Ramon Morató's Chocolate.