I made Truffles tonight.....

...and I am pleased with the results. These are chocolate truffles, mind you, not mushrooms! This was my first attempt at truffles.

Total time to make them was probably 5-6 hours, which included chopping chocolate, toasting hazelnuts and coconut, making raspberry puree, mixing chocolate and heated heavy cream (did that on lunch break), piping, rolling, coating, chilling, "enrobing" in the coconut, cocoa or nuts. Danila came over tonight and helped with a key part where you really need two people (this is the recipe I used, by the way). We rolled the ganache with rubber gloves after I piped them out on trays in mounds and chilled them for a bit. We had to place our hands on an ice pack to cool them down periodically so as to not make the chocolate too soft.

I then coated the truffles in plain, melted bittersweet chocolate (not mixed with any heavy cream) with bare, clean hands (ran out of gloves). The coating will form a hard shell around the truffle. Before the coating solidified, Danila rolled them in the various toppings. I tasted a couple of the truffles, and the slight "crack" of the shell is quite delightful, then you reach the creamy, rich middle. I believe my favorite is the coconut covered variety (shown in the back of the photo).

Oh, I didn't get any chocolate on my clothes or the carpet! Mom will be proud and will think back to all the times I got grated cheese all over the counter and floor as a wee lass at home (or a teen, really). Danila was pretty tidy too. Now for some more clean-up.....