Homemade Chocolate Truffles have a creamy ganache center for a smooth, rich treat that melts in your mouth. This easy chocolate truffle recipe is made with just 4 ingredients, then rolled in cocoa powder, sprinkles, or nuts for a delicious finish. It's one of the easiest homemade candy recipes to make and perfect for any occasion!
Table of Contents
- Decadent Chocolate Truffles Recipe
- What are Chocolate Truffles?
- Why you'll love this Truffle Chocolate recipe
- Chocolate Truffle ingredients
- How to make Chocolate Truffles
- Chocolate Truffle FAQs
- Chocolate Truffles Recipe: Flavoring ideas
- Chocolate Truffle Recipe: Coating ideas
- Truffle Chocolate tips and tricks
- How to store Chocolate Truffles
- More Chocolate Recipes
- Chocolate Truffles Recipe
Decadent Chocolate Truffles Recipe
The best chocolate truffles are always the ones made fresh at home. They are decadent bites of bliss and the soft chocolate centers melt right in your mouth.
If you have ever had the Lindt Lindor chocolate truffles, you know what I'm talking about with their creamy centers. Dark chocolate truffles are elegant in their simplicity and perfect for any occasion!
We love bite-size balls of deliciousness like these and our German Chocolate Cake Truffles, Oreo Balls, and Buckeyes.
What are Chocolate Truffles?
Chocolate truffles are a type of confectionery made primarily from chocolate and cream. Traditional chocolate truffles are made by heating cream and pouring it over chopped chocolate, creating a smooth mixture called ganache. The ganache is then cooled and shaped into small, bite-sized balls. These balls are usually coated with cocoa powder, powdered sugar, or finely chopped nuts to resemble the earthy appearance of actual truffle mushrooms but they also can be dipped in melted chocolate and then allowed to set, creating a harder chocolate shell around the creamy ganache center.
Why you'll love this Truffle Chocolate recipe
- Real, simple ingredients.
- No candy thermometer or serious cooking required.
- They look beautiful and taste even better.
Chocolate Truffle ingredients
This is a quick overview of some of the important ingredients you'll need for this chocolate truffles recipe. Specific measurements and full recipe instructions are in the printable recipe card below.
- Chocolate: Use the best quality chocolate you can find since these truffles really are a celebration of chocolate. When making dark chocolate truffles, we like to look for chocolate with 60% cacao or more. Milk chocolate can also be used, but you will want to scale back on the amount of cream added (see recipe notes).
- Heavy cream: Also sometimes labeled as heavy whipping cream, there really isn't a good substitute that I'm away of for this particular recipe. Be sure to get heavy cream and not just whipping cream, which doesn't have the same fat content and won't give the same results.
- Butter: A little bit of salted butter gives the perfect soft set and hint of fudgy, buttery flavor to the truffle centers.
- Vanilla extract: Chocolate and vanilla should always go hand-in-hand as it adds depth and dimension to the truffles.
You might also want food-safe plastic gloves, which make rolling the truffles much easier.
How to make Chocolate Truffles
- Start by chopping up your chocolate. Smaller pieces of chopped chocolate melt much more easily than big chunks. Scrape all of that delicious chocolate into a bowl along with the butter.
- Heat the heavy cream in the microwave or on the stovetop until it is just steaming. You don't want it to come to a boil though. Pour this over the chocolate and butter, then leave it alone for 5 minutes without stirring! You want to let the chocolate melt from the residual heat of the cream.
- After 5 minutes, add the vanilla and use a spoon to stir until a smooth, glossy ganache forms. If there are chunks of unmelted chocolate, gently heat the ganache in the microwave for a few seconds, then stir again.
- Transfer the ganache to the fridge to chill for 1-2 hours. You want the ganache to be firm and scoopable, but not hard.
- Use a small scoop to drop small mounds of the truffle centers onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Keep them small at around 2 teaspoons each. Roll them into balls. Using plastic gloves helps create a barrier that prevents the chocolate from melting between your hands as quickly. It's okay if they aren't perfectly round.
- Roll each truffle into your chosen toppings like chopped nuts, sprinkles, or unsweetened cocoa powder. The coatings typically cover up imperfections in the rolling technique, if that is giving you a hard time.
- Serve at room temperature for best results!
Chocolate Truffle FAQs
Look for blocks or bars of dark chocolate that is anywhere between 60% and 75% cacao for making truffles. Our favorite easily available sources are Trader Joe's Dark Chocolate Pound Plus Bar (what we used here), or the Ghiradelli or Guittard baking bars.
Milk chocolate is softer and requires some adjusting to the recipe and chocolate with a higher cacao content tends to be more bitter than we like for sweet, creamy truffle centers.
While they are not my first choice, you can certainly use chocolate chips if that's what you have on hand. You still might want to roughly chop them up a bit to help them melt more smoothly. I also recommend using the best quality chocolate chips you have access to for the best end results.
If the chocolate doesn't melt completely after sitting with the hot cream for 5 minutes, you can finish it by setting your bowl over a small pan of simmering water and stirring until the chocolate is melted. This usually only happens when the chocolate isn't chopped up very well to begin with or the cream just didn't get hot enough for it's residual heat to melt the chocolate.
Regular chocolate typically refers to solid chocolate bars or other forms of chocolate confectionery that are made from a combination of cocoa solids, cocoa butter, sugar, and sometimes milk solids. Truffles, on the other hand, are a specific type of chocolate confection that is made from a creamy ganache center, with a soft, melt-in-your-mouth texture due to the ganache. They are usually small, bite-sized treats and are often associated with luxury and indulgence.
Chocolate Truffles Recipe: Flavoring ideas
The recipe below is for a classic dark chocolate truffle, but you can experiment with other flavor variations. Here are some ideas to get you started.
- Fruit Jams: Add 2 tablespoons of seedless raspberry jam to the chocolate before pouring the hot cream over the top for raspberry chocolate truffles.
- Using extracts: Stir in a small amount of your favorite extract like peppermint, almond, cherry, or coconut. Keep in mind that a little goes a long way when it comes to extracts. I would start with â…› teaspoon, taste, then go from there.
- Peanut butter: If you can't resist the allure of the combo of peanut butter and chocolate, add 1-2 tablespoons of creamy peanut butter with the chocolate before adding the hot cream.
- Spices: A pinch of cinnamon or cayenne pepper can give really delicious results. I particularly like cinnamon chocolate truffles rolled in desiccated coconut.
Chocolate Truffle Recipe: Coating ideas
Rolling the chocolate truffles in delicious coatings not only makes them tasty and pretty, but it also makes them manageable since the centers are so soft.
- More chocolate! Unsweetened cocoa powder is a classic approach and it's slight bitterness perfectly offsets the sweet truffle centers.
- Nuts. Finely chopped nuts like walnuts or pistachios add delicious texture and flavor.
- Sprinkles. Chocolate sprinkles are always fun and colorful sprinkles can be used for any occasion to make holiday truffles.
- Candy coatings. We have also used finely crushed freeze-dried strawberry powder, peppermint candy canes, and powdered sugar in the past.
Truffle Chocolate tips and tricks
- Wear plastic gloves. This might be my biggest piece of advice. I always have a much easier time rolling the soft centers into balls while wearing plastic gloves. You might even want to double up on the gloves to provide some insulation against the heat of your hands warming up the chocolate too much.
- Chop your chocolate. The finer you chop the chocolate, the easier it will be for it to melt and stir into a smooth ganache.
- Chill before rolling. If your centers are too soft to roll into balls once you scoop them, place them back in the fridge for 20 minutes to firm up.
- Let ganache sit at room temperature. If your ganache gets too firm to roll, let it sit out at room temperature for a while to soften.
How to store Chocolate Truffles
- How to store: Store your finished chocolate truffles in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks in an airtight container. You can serve them chilled straight from the fridge or let them sit out at for a while to come to room temperature before serving. We think they are best served at room temperature for the best texture and flavor.
- How to freeze: Truffles freeze well for up to 6 months. I recommend storing them in layers with a piece of parchment paper in between to protect them, especially if you are mixing truffles covered in cocoa powder with other coatings since the cocoa powder dust sometimes mars the finish of the other truffles. Thaw overnight in the fridge or on the counter before enjoying.
More Chocolate Recipes
- Raspberry Chocolate Tart
- Triple Chocolate Cheesecake
- Devil's Food Cake with Chocolate Frosting
- Triple Chocolate Scones
Did you make this recipe?
Let me know what you thought with a comment and rating below. You can also take a picture and tag me on Instagram @houseofnasheats or share it on the Pinterest pin so I can see.
Chocolate Truffles
Ingredients
Truffle Centers
- 8 ounces dark, semisweet, or bittersweet chocolate, between 60% and 75% cacao content (226g)
- 1 Tablespoons salted butter, softened
- â…” cup heavy cream (160ml)
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Truffle Coating Ideas
- Cocoa powder
- Sprinkles
- Finely chopped walnuts, pistachios, or almonds
- Melted chocolate, for dipping
- Powdered freeze-dried strawberries
- Finely crushed peppermint candy canes
Instructions
- Finely chop the chocolate and transfer it to a large bowl. Add the butter and set aside. See notes for additional flavor options and when to add.
- Heat the heavy cream in the microwave for 45-60 seconds until very hot but not boiling. This can also be done in a small saucepan on the stovetop by bringing the cream just to a simmer.
- Pour the hot cream over the chocolate. Let sit for 5 minutes without stirring.
- Add vanilla extract then stir the chocolate and cream mixture until smooth. Chill 1-2 hours until set up.
- Use a small scoop to scoop 2 teaspoons of the ganache for each truffle onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. You may want to set them in the fridge for 10-20 minutes before rolling at this point.
- Roll each truffle between the palms of your hands to shape them into balls. I highly recommend wearing food-safe plastic gloves because the soft truffles have a tendency to want to melt and the plastic barrier protects them a bit and makes the process easier.
- Roll each truffle in your chosen coatings or dip them in chocolate, then transfer to a plate to serve.
Notes
- How to store: Store your finished chocolate truffles in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks in an airtight container. You can serve them chilled straight from the fridge or let them sit out at for a while to come to room temperature before serving. We think they are best served at room temperature for the best texture and flavor. Some coatings don't store as well like powdered sugar or crushed candy canes.
- How to freeze: Truffles freeze well for up to 6 months. I recommend storing them in layers with a piece of parchment paper in between to protect them, especially if you are mixing truffles covered in cocoa powder with other coatings since the cocoa powder dust sometimes mars the finish of the other truffles. Thaw overnight in the fridge or on the counter before enjoying.
- Fruit Jams: Add 2 tablespoons of seedless raspberry jam to the chocolate before pouring the hot cream over the top for raspberry chocolate truffles.
- Using extracts: Stir in a small amount of your favorite extract like peppermint, almond, cherry, or coconut. Keep in mind that a little goes a long way when it comes to extracts. I would start with â…› teaspoon, taste, then go from there.
- Peanut butter: If you can't resist the allure of the combo of peanut butter and chocolate, add 1-2 tablespoons of creamy peanut butter with the chocolate before adding the hot cream.
- Spices: A pinch of cinnamon or cayenne pepper can give really delicious results. I particularly like cinnamon chocolate truffles rolled in desiccated coconut.
Hi Amy, I love chocolate truffles. Tq for all recipes that you sharing with us. Awaiting till the next recipe.
Lina from Malaysia.
It never mentions the vanilla
Thanks for pointing it out! It gets added with to the chocolate and cream before stirring.
Can you ship the Chocolate Truffles?
Yes, you can!