Chai-spiced coffee truffles

 

Chocolate truffles are one of the easiest desserts you can make. In its most basic form, it’s just chocolate and cream, which is called a ganache. Since there are so few ingredients, you want to make sure the chocolate flavor really stands out. There are two good ways to do that.

The first way is to use good quality chocolate. You should want to eat the chocolate on its own. Around 60% cacao dark chocolate is my favorite chocolate to use.

The second way is to incorporate coffee into the recipe. Coffee enhances and intensifies the flavor of chocolate without the lingering taste of coffee. Both chocolate and coffee are inherently bitter. So when you add a small amount of coffee to chocolate the bitterness of the coffee under its the bitterness of the chocolate and makes it taste more chocolatey.

There are a couple different ways to impart coffee flavor in baked goods. My favorite way to do so when making truffles is to steep the cream with your favorite coffee beans. By using beans instead of generic espresso powder you can customize the flavor more. The beans I used from Helm Coffee Roasters in Indianapolis have flavor notes of chocolate and caramel. 

Helm is Indy's newest coffee roaster, and I can't recommend them enough. Owners Jill and Carol are working hard to build a community, and they host a new parent support group every Tuesday at 10:30 a.m. that I've found to be really helpful as I navigate motherhood for the first time.

I tested this recipe with and without the coffee beans and there is a significant difference in flavor. The truffles tasted a little flat without the coffee. If you are worried about the caffeine content, you can use decaf coffee beans.

Chai-spiced coffee truffles

Yield: Makes about 30 truffles

Time: About 1 hour

Ingredients

• 1 Tablespoon ground ginger
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons ground cardamom
• 1 teaspoon ground allspice
• 1 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 180 milliliters (3/4 cup) heavy cream
• 1/2 cup coffee beans
• 360 grams dark chocolate (around 60% cacao), chopped fine
• 1 Tablespoon dutch-processed cocoa powder

Directions

1. Combine ginger, cinnamon, cardamom, allspice, cloves, and black pepper in bowl. Set aside 1 Tablespoon.
2. Pour heavy cream in small saucepan with spice mixture and coffee beans. Heat on low-medium until it simmers.
3. Remove from heat, place lid over saucepan, and steep for at least 30 minutes and up to overnight in the refrigerator.
4. Strain cream to remove coffee beans and return to simmer. Pour over chopped chocolate. Let sit for 3 minutes and stir until chocolate is melted and mixture is smooth.
5. Let ganache cool until it's solid—about 1 hour in refrigerator.
6. Combine leftover spice mixture with cocoa powder.
7. Scoop teaspoon-sized balls of ganache and roll in cocoa powder-spice mixture.
8. Store truffles in refrigerator.