Chocolate Truffles and 1 Year of Blogging

I can't believe I've been blogging for a year, sharing my recipes and in turn meeting new people. It's been an interesting year, with long illness/thesis related gaps in posting and a new business venture started, but I've enjoyed it immensely and I can't wait for the second anniversary!


To celebrate this I decided to dust off a chocolate truffle recipe I have to practice for valentines day. I love dark chocolate and I find it is the easiest type of chocolate to work with when making truffles. I've made white chocolate truffles before but they ended up being a little too soft, despite a large amount of icing sugar and ground almonds I added to bind the mixture... I've heard of people adding butter but I think that makes then truffles greasy and far too heavy (really unpleasant)... I'll have to work that little problem out before I have to make them again. Actually, if anyone has any suggestions I'd love to hear them :)


I tend to use 80% cocoa chocolate for this but if you want a slightly less bitter chocolate taste you can reduce the cocoa content, although I wouldn't go below 65%. The icing sugar and cocoa powder amount is really really variable and will also be affected by whatever flavours you are adding but just wing it, testing for sweetness as you go.


Dark Chocolate Truffles
Makes around 40

• 450g dark chocolate (at least 65% cocoa)
• 250 ml full cream
• 4-5 tbsp cocoa powder
• 6-8 tbsp icing sugar

Break the chocolate into small pieces and put into a bowl.

Heat the cream in a saucepan until it is just boiling

Remove from the heat and pour over the chocolate, stirring gently

Leave to stand for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the chocolate has all melted

Alternate adding the icing sugar and cocoa powder until a thick but smooth

ganache consistency is reached; at this stage you will want to be tasting for sweetness

and adding more or less than the recommended icing sugar and cocoa powder

Chill in the fridge for at least 30 minutes then roll teaspoonful sized clumps of the 

mix into balls

Coat in cocoa powder and enjoy

Almond Truffles

Use the basic mix above but BEFORE CHILLING, substitute one of the tablespoons of cocoa powder and one of the tablespoons of icing sugar for two tablespoons of ground almonds

Add 3 drops of almond essence and mix well

Chill normally and coat in ground almonds

Hazelnut Truffles

As above but substitute 1 tablespoons of cocoa powder for 2 tbsp of Nutella and 2 tbsp of ground hazelnuts

Chill and roll in ground hazelnuts

Rum Truffles

As above but add 2-3 tablespoons of spiced rum to the mix, adding more icing sugar if the mixture is too runny. 

Roll in cocoa powder after chilling