Even though the center of a truffle is traditionally ganache, truffles can be made with a variety of fillings ranging from nuts to caramel to nougat. When not made with ganache, these truffles are generally coated in a thin shell of hard chocolate. The truffles in this recipe will be made with a ganache center.
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Obtain 1 pound (455 g) of dark chocolate and 1 cup (235 mL) heavy whipping cream. Be sure to select a chocolate that you enjoy the flavor of.
Cut the chocolate into pieces using a large serrated knife (like a sturdy bread knife). Cutting the chocolate into strips about 5 mm apart with the serrated knife will cause the chocolate to break into small pieces. Pieces of chocolate will fall all over the place, so I like to place the cutting board in a sheet pan to catch the chocolate shards.
After breaking down the whole pound of chocolate, you should have a bunch of similarly sized pieces. Small, uniformly sized pieces will make melting the chocolate evenly easier. Pour all the pieces into a medium heat proof bowl.
Bring the cup of heavy whipping cream just to a boil. (This is called scalding.)
Pour the scalded heavy cream onto the chocolate and allow it to sit for five minutes.
Stir the now melted chocolate with the cream. Chocolate and small amounts of aqueous solutions (liquids containing water) do not mix well - the chocolate clumps up in what is called seizing. However, when a substantial amount of liquid is added to the chocolate, we can make chocolate syrup. A ganache is simply a syrup of chocolate and cream that does not contain enough cream to be liquid at room temperature. Once this mixture cools, it will form a hard ganache that can be molded into shapes.
The melted ganache should be smooth in texture without lumps. If not all the chocolate has melted, you can heat the ganache gently over a hot pot of water. Stir until the chocolate melts and the ganache is smooth.
You can transfer the ganache into a smaller bowl to cool. When the ganache is solid, it may be easier for you to scoop out when working with a smaller bowl. Let the ganache cool down and chill for about an hour in the refrigerator to harden. Cold ganache is harder to scoop, but easier to form into a ball.
Using a melon baller or small ice cream scoop (such as a #70), scoop out balls of hard ganache and place on a cookie sheet lined with either parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. As the ganache gets warmer, it will have a tendency to stick to the scooping device. You might find it easier to work with after rechilling the ganache, dipping the utensil in ice water, or simply using your hands to form rough spheres.
After forming all the balls, chill the pan in the refrigerator for fifteen minutes to allow the ganache to harden back up and set into their shapes.
Scoop a little cocoa powder into a small bowl. Use a pair of spoons to pick up and roll each ganache ball in the cocoa powder to coat.
If you prefer a hard chocolate shell, then you'll need to melt and temper some chocolate (usually, a couple ounces will be more than enough to coat the truffles). Once the chocolate has been tempered, use a spatula to spread some onto the palm of one hand. Place the ball of ganache into the layer of chocolate and rotate, coating the ball. Place the truffle on a sheet of parchment paper or silicone baking mat or other nonstick surface for it to cool and set. Repeat the spreading of chocolate on the palm and coating for each truffle. The tempered chocolate will shrink slightly as it cools and clad itself to the ganache. Because of this shrinking action, if it cools too rapidly, the shell can crack, so don't immediately chill them in the refrigerator - allow the truffles to set in a cool room. The ganache should also be allowed to warm up a bit before you coat them. After the chocolate has hardened, chill for 15 minutes in the refrigerator and then remove and store at room temperature. The chocolate coated truffles should not be allowed to touch each other (touching the truffles together can mar the hard surface of the truffles) - so divide them with small paper cups or paper muffin liners.
The cocoa dusted truffles can be packed together without harm. These truffles can be stored at cool room temperature in an airtight container for at least a month - but good luck keeping them from being eaten for that long!Chocolate Truffles (yields about 32 to 36 truffles)
| 1 lb. (455 g) dark chocolate | cut into small pieces | pour onto chocolate | wait 5 min. | stir until smooth | chill | form into balls | dust |
| 1 cup (235 mL) heavy whipping cream | scald | ||||||
| cocoa powder | |||||||
it wasn't the look I was going for, but it was delicious. it retained the dark chocolate taste, even with all the cream, but it was lighter, more delicate.
Perhaps since I had more liquid, the chocolate melted more easily, but I found fairly coars pieces of broken chocolate had no problem melting.
I usually only coat the ganache in cocoa powder. Most truffles I've seen are either/or, but it is quite possible to coat with hard chocolate and then with a dusting of cocoa powder - but the cocoa powder won't stick all that well and it's a shame to cover up the chocolate coating...
for great contrast and flavor:
- use icing/confectioner's/powdered sugar for rolling the dark chocolate ganache
- use white chocolate in place of dark, in making ganache balls, then roll in unsweetened cocoa powder
- tint white chocolate ganache with paste or gel food color, then roll in powdered sugar. if you make red and green, looks great on the christmas spread! pink for valentine's or sweet sixteen!
- roll in grated desiccated coconut or chopped unsalted roasted nuts, instead of cocoa powder.
- if you dip the ganache balls in melted dark chocolate, instead of cocoa powder, melt some white chocolate and drizzle on top and vice versa.
- for an elegant dinner party, use the melted dark chocolate coating, then buy some edible gold and silver powder from baking specialty shops and dust over.
- add a piece of unsalted, roasted nut or dried fruit in the center of each ganache for a sweet surprise.
- white scalding the cream, infuse with vanilla (split beans or extract) or other flavors like grated orange rind(great with milk chocolate ganache), instant coffee powder is great with dark chocolate; cayenne powder for the adventurous!
- for grown-up parties, a tablespoon or two of bailey's, kahlua, grand marnier, cherry brandy, tequila rose, etc., in the melted ganache will give an extra kick. DarkAeons' right on the mark! remember to use good liqueur!
i can feel the pounds coming on...
A good dessert for the afternoon snack of the childrens.
Best regards.
Susan
Ange - http://viciousange.blogspot.com/
Where does one get "truffle quality" dark chocolate?
Any dark chocolate that you enjoy eating will work well for this recipe.
What are the rules for safely storing chocolates made with perishable ingredients?
Thanks!
What are the rules for safely storing chocolates made with perishable ingredients?
With this ratio of chocolate to cream, it should be able to be stored at cool room temperature (65°F) in an airtight container for one month.
Love the site, I check it often.
I started the site using a point and shoot Canon S300. After a few months, I switched to a Nikon D100 when enabled me to use my Nikon SLR lenses. From 2004 to late 2006, I used the Nikon D100 and last month moved to a Nikon D200 which gives me a little more flexibility in working with raw files for post capture color balance processing. (The D100's write speeds were so slow that shooting raw files would be intolerable.)
These days, I try to take many of the pictures with natural light which gives the food a pleasant appearance as opposed to the flat, flash pictures that I used to provide in the articles.
I was also pleasantly surprised that the fresh-from-the-fridge ganache, once rolled in the cocoa powder, didn't 'sweat' into the paper bag I put them in and left them at room temperature. Definitely a recipe I'll bookmark, write down, and keep to use again!
Next I'll experiment with different liqueurs and other flavors.
Thanks for the wonderful and easy recipe!!
Thanks!
If it's pure chocolate (look at the ingredients label) then it should be fine. If it has other stuff in it (like a chocolate bar or a chocolate confection) then it's probably not going to work. I like my chocolate dark, so I used 72% (the percentage refers to cacao content) dark chocolate for this recipe. I think most people find semi-sweet is more to their taste.
By the way, your site is great!
Least amount of work for the most amount of praise.
And will the different chocolate affect how long you can store them?
[list:8765ed6a5f]
Starbucks Liqueur - rolled in cocoa, garnished with a whole coffee bean
Cointreau - rolled in cocoa, garnished with candied orange zest
Malibu Rum - rolled in coconut
Frangelico - rolled in finely chopped hazelnuts
Disarono - rolled in cocoa, garnished with sliced almond
Chambord - rolled in coco, I couldn't think of a good garnish for this. I ended up using marzipan mixed with Chambord
Barenjager - rolled in cocoa, garnished with honeycomb
Peanut butter - rolled in chopped peanuts[/list:u:8765ed6a5f]
I first want to try adding a little cayenne to the cocoa powder... I've read that the capsaicin interacts nicely with the polyphenols in chocolate, thus "turning up" the flavor. I also want to try crushed espresso beans and chopped hazelnuts.
I want to experiment as well with adding different liqueurs, particularly Frangelico, Grand Marinier, Vandermint, and Chambord. How much of a cordial should I add to the ganache mixture? At what point would I add the additional liquid?
One minor note... they did not melt as easily or quickly on the tongue as some truffles I've had, though they had the best flavor of any that I'd tasted. If I wanted a lower melting point, should I merely add more cream? Or do I need to add even more fat of some other type?
I also tried to dip the ganache into melted semi-sweet baking chocolate chips to make a hard shell, but it was difficult. I found the melted chocolate very viscous, so it was hard to make a nice thin coating. If I warm the chocolate coating a bit, it becomes too warm and tends to melt the ganache... I ended up making big truffles with thick hard shell in strange shapes. I'm not sure if it'd be better if I work with my palms...but it looked too sticky to work easily.
Any tips for me??
It's easiest to spread the melted chocolate onto your palm and quickly roll the ganache ball through it instead of dipping.
Any advice would be appreciated..
The cocoa content of the chocolate makes a huge difference in the behavior of the chocolate. You should find a chocolate which is at minimum 70% cocoa.
Waht type of chocolate are you using? Bar chocolate for baking or chocolate chips or candy bar chocolate?
Waht type of chocolate are you using? Bar chocolate for baking or chocolate chips or candy bar chocolate?[/quote:a7a859dbdf]
Yes, I've used the PoundPlus brand from Trader Joe's for this recipe before without a problem. I know you said the chocolate/cream mixture seemed smooth before you put it in the fridge, but it might help to keep it warm on a double boiler (just boil the water, then turn off the heat entirely. The residual heat will be enough to keep melting the chocolate) and stir until you're entirely sure it's smooth. Then let it cool at room temperature until they are room temperature - takes about an hour. That might help...
Nice post though :)
For my next batch i'm going to try some different coatings (my skills aren't up to tempered chocolate!), maybe mixing in some fine sugar with the cocoa, or cinnamon, or chilli as suggested above.
Cheers
Steve
If you are properly tempering your chocolate, then I would probably recommend trying coating chocolate (sometimes called compound chocolate) which has a higher melting point (because of it's use of vegetable oils instead of cocoa butter). It also doesn't require tempering for that same reason.
Ganache should not be liquid once it returns to room temperature. Assuming you measured the ingredients properly (for 1 pound of chocolate with 1 cup heavy cream will make a pretty hard ganache - 1 pound of chocolate can take a lot more than 1 cup cream without a problem), the only thing that I can think of is the 2 Tbs. of cognac, but I would not expect such a small quantity to cause a problem. In the worst case, if the ganache continues to be liquidy, you can always use it as a luxurious topping to a dessert (like a brownie) or in/on a cake.
Are you using Hershey's Special Dark Chocolate Candy Bars or Hershey's Special Dark Baking Bars? The ingredient mix is a bit different. The candy bar probably won't work - you'll want to find a chocolate that simply has cocoa (or cacao) (solids and butter), sugar, and a little lecithin as it's ingredients. Anything more may not work well in a recipe designed for making chocolate candies. If the baking bar has excessive ingredients (like the candy bar) then look for another brand.
Oh, another tip: buy chocolate for recipes in the baking section of your grocery store instead of the chocolate/candy section. The chocolate there will be more "pure" and won't have additives that help make the chocolate taste better or melt better in the mouth that may adversely affect its performance in a recipe.
thanx for the recipe
I am hoping that someone can help me out here.
Where I come from there is either Heavy cream (with gelatin) or UHT whipping cream.
Which one do I use?
Thanks.
Thanks.
Use the UHT cream.
Thank you for your help.
The ganache did not turn out the way it was shown. This is my first time handling chocolate. Its probably something I did wrong along the way.
The chocolate mix did not set, instead it became curdled, and I saw a layer of oil on top of the mix. That was bad isn't it?
The chocolate bar i used was the lindt excellence 70% cocoa. Can this be used?
Look forward to hearing from you again.
Cheers
I was just wondering about the shelf life of these goodies. I am just starting to make truffles and I am really looking for something I am able to keep around for 2 months... possibly three. With the cream in this, I don't think it is a good idea to keep that long!! ;) Any ideas?
Thanks for all anticipated responses~
Jo
The outer shell can also be made of melted chocolate that is tempered - i.e., the melted chocolate temperature is between 83F to 95F - the lower temperature ensures a thicker shell coating while the higher a thinner shell. Dipping is quite a highly labor intensive process unless you go into commercial.
Go on-line for chocolate bars sources - prices will vary but make sure the content includes only the chocolate liquor and sugar and nothing else!
I store my truffles by layers in a jar in the refrigerator for short time periods and in the freezer for longer (up to 1 year) but let them return to room temperature before serving.
Excellent basic source book author Alice Medrich - "Bittersweet". :)
He tripled the batch and did it all in one go. Maybe that was just too much chocolate for the scalded cream to handle? The only thing going against this theory is that when I gently melted a small amount of the ganache in a bowl over hot water, it didn't come back together. That leads me to believe that it seized and that I just wasted $20 worth of chocolate and heavy cream.
He put foil over the bowl of ganache when he put it in the fridge. I was thinking that maybe condensation collected on the foil and dripped into the chocolate causing it to seize? The surface of the ganache wasn't marred at all, though.
For the record, he used Trader Joe's Pound Plus 72% dark chocolate.
Any ideas?
melt the butter, watch it not to burn.
get ganache you prepared earlier.
experiment on a small amount first.
put it in the microwave for a few seconds, being very careful not to burn it. take it out then add the butter little by little. just work on it by feeling the mixture until it is velvety smooth. the secret here is the technique of mixing it properly to attain the smooth mixture. then put in the refrigerator to firm it again. scoop. roll. coat. let me know how it turns up :)
Couple of batches of ganache that i made turn out having this layer of fat/oil after it was set. and it doesn't make it smooth anymore when i eat it.
Any way to not have the fats come out during the cooling process?
Cheers
thanks
I'm sorry it didn't work for you. How soft is it that it can't be formed? It it almost runny? You can always use ultra-soft ganache between layers of a cake or to ice cupcakes.
Thanks much, Melissa:)
OK. So, when your ganache is completely homogenous and smooth, you will want to transfer to a baking dish, so that more surface area is available to the ganache and will thus cool faster. Cover the surface with plastic wrap, placing the plastic wrap directly on the surface of the ganache (this protects the flavor and also keeps all condensation off of the ganache). Cover with another layer of plastic wrap and put into the reefer for at least 2 hours.
At this point, you have a perfectly lovely ganache for a regular truffle. But if you want to whip the ganache, then follow the below steps.
Take the cooled ganache and place into a mixer with the whip attachment. Remove approximately 1/2 cup of the mixture, put into the microwave and melt, in 30 second increments, stirring between each time, until completely melted. When the ganache has melted, turn on your mixer ON LOW, and slowly pour melted ganache over ganache in mixer. This will soften the ganache. As ganache gets soft, and there is no more liquid, turn up the mixer. Whip the ganache. The ganache will lighten, due to more air being incorporated, and will begin to look like a chocolate buttercream. It will be softer than regular ganache, but will still be scoopable. Turn off the mixer, use an ice cream scooper or pipe out of a bag, to make your balls. Then--and this is what I always do for truffles--cover them with plastic wrap, and put them in the freezer for at least an hour. This sets the ganache and allows the chocolate that you will be coating the centers with to harden more quickly.
While your ganache is in the freezer, chop more milk chocolate, about 8 oz, and put into a microwave safe bowl. (This is a quick, straight tempering method and skips "tabliering" and other much more difficult steps, especially when used in combination with very cold, almost frozen truffle centers). On high, in 30 second increments, melt the chocolate. Between each turn in the microwave, gently stir the chocolate. When the chocolate is about 75-80% melted, just stop using the microwave and stir gently until all of the chocolate is melted. When all of the chocolate is melted, dip your finger in the chocolate and put a dab on the skin right above your upper lip. It should feel slightly warmer than body temp. Now, remove your centers from the freezer and, working quickly, roll the centers between your palms to smooth them out slightly. Pour your sugar into a sheet pan. Now, get a friend, because this takes two people!!! Both people should wear gloves, too.
Smear chocolate on one palm, take a center and roll in between your hands and toss into the sugar. The 2nd person should QUICKLY roll the truffle in the sugar and place on a clean, parchment lined sheet pan. Repeat, etc.
I know it might sound involved, but its not too bad, and with the production line I just told you about, I have done over 250 truffles in less than a couple of hours, start to finish. I promise it works.
THANK YOU!!!!!!!! I am so psyched to try making these! I will recruit my daughter to do the sugar rolling! I will let you know if I am successful!
Again, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!
~Melissa
I just finished my first batch of truffles using your recipe and they are AWESOME!!! They are almost identical to the truffles I was remembering. It seems it was the technique used to whip the chocolate centers that I was not mastering. Thanks again for the tips, I greatly appreciate it!
~Melissa