Shoes, Ships, and Sealing Wax

Creme de cacao truffles

Okay, my dislike of cooking (as opposed to my great love of food and eating) is well established. So when I do cook (or assemble) food, I try to do the easiest thing possible.

A few years ago I had to bring some treat to work for a party, and I found a recipe in one of those colorful little cookbooks they sell at the grocery store checkout. (You know those cookbooks...most of the ingredients are brand name products, and most of the recipes are designed to take like ten minutes to make. Just my speed.)

Since this recipe required no actual cooking beyond melting chocolate, I decided to give it a shot. It was for chocolate truffles, something I'd never tasted. I made a batch...a bit sloppy, because I am a slob, but not too hard. I didn't much care for the results, but I am not a huge chocolate fan.

I took them to work. The people who like chocolate seemed to like them okay, although a few of the connaisseurs were slightly appalled by how I'd made them.

That afternoon, one of the gentlemen in the office, an older chemist from eastern Europe, came to my desk and said, with his wonderful old world accent, "I understand you made those truffles." I said I had. He said "When I was young, my mother made truffles." Then he whispered, like he was afraid she might hear, "Yours are even better."

Well, I no longer cared what the confection connaisseurs thought, because never in my life has anyone suggested that I made anything better than his mother!

So I have made truffles every year since, and a box of them goes straight to Dr. Chemist. Here's the recipe I use:

Creme de cacao truffles

(Adapted from a Kraft Philadelphia Cream Cheese recipe)

3 cups of sifted powdered sugar [I sift this one, because when you've been told your truffles are better than someone's mother's, you don't want to mess it up!]
8 ounces of softened cream cheese
12 ounces of chocolate chips, melted
3 tablespoons of creme de cacao
Unsweetened powdered cocoa

Melt the chocolate chips over low heat. While the chocolate is melting, beat the cream cheese and powdered sugar with an electric mixer untill well blended. [I add the sugar about a cup at a time.] Add the chocolate and mix, then add the creme de cacao and mix. [This is a deviation from the original. I don't keep a lot of liqueurs around, and dividing the mix into thirds to make different flavors seemed too much like work, so instead of doing Amaretto, Grand Marnier, and Kahlua, I stuck with chocolate.] Chill the mixture for a few hours, then roll into small (about 1 inch) balls. Roll the balls lightly in powdered cocoa. [Deviation Number 2. The first year I did use coconut, chopped nuts, etc., but it was a pain, and Dr. Chemist seemed to like the plain cocoa ones best, so that's what I go with now.] Put each truffle in a small paper muffin tin liner [that's what I found at the grocery store; I think you can buy actual candy holder thingys somewhere] so they don't stick together. Keep in a refrigerator.

Here is the finished product:

And this is what it does to my kitchen. This year was sloppier than usual; I think I tried to mix before the cream cheese had sufficiently softened.

Posted by Nic at December 17, 2003 11:02 AM | TrackBack