A couple of weeks ago I was having dinner with some of my friends and their daughter and I came up with a plan to make chocolate truffles for her classmates for Valentine’s day. So, today, we did just that. We used the ganache that I had leftover from the Sarah Bernhardts that I made yesterday.
The Munchkin chose orange zest, roses, sea salt, and cocoa powder for garnishing. She may be 10, but she has quite the refined palate.
We spooned out portions of the ganache and rolled them into balls.
Since the chocolate melted in our hands, it required some cleaning up between batches. Don’t worry, the Munchkin also used the sink for this step…)
When we were finished making the balls, we prepared the garnishes.
For one variation, we crushed dried rose buds and mixed the petals with some orange zest and rolled the truffles in it.
For the other, we rolled the truffles in cocoa powder. Both types got a touch of vanilla sea salt on top. Finally we put one of each in their little boxes…
…and tied them up with a ribbon and a card.
They are simple and delicious!
Here is a basic recipe for ganache:
1/2 lb. finely chopped semisweet or bittersweet chocolate
1 c. cream
1/4 tsp. salt
Place chopped chocolate in a heat-proof mixing bowl and set aside. Place cream and salt in a heavy bottomed saucepan and slowly bring to a boil. Pour the hot cream on top of the chocolate and whisk until smooth. Leave the ganache at room temperature for least 6 hours. Note: You can speed up the “setting up” process by refrigerating it and stirring it every 20 minutes until it is set, but I don’t recommend this technique, it tends to come out a bit grainy in texture.
Heli-Claire's Kitchen 