These chocolate truffles are so irresistible that some people (you know who you are!) decide to give them to their mother for her birthday but ‘totally by accident’ eat the whole heavenly lot themselves in the car on their way over there.

What’s so good about these truffles is that they taste and look like the real handmade deal from a chique ‘maison du chocola’ but that they are actually reasonably easy to make yourself. Making chocolates and bonbons is challenging partly because you have to temper the chocolate to get the shiny coating and the right crispy chocolate texture. With these truffles that is not the case, as you will discover when you make them. And making them is a big part of the enjoyment, with delicious chocolate and vanilla smells filling your house. So if you decided to make them for your mother…learn from the mistakes of others and just make a double batch (but keep in mind that this recipe already enriches you with 100 truffles!).

This is how you make the truffels
Cut the vanilla pod length wise and scraped out the seeds. Bring the cream with pinch of salt, the vanilla seeds and the vanilla pod almost to a boil and let it simmer very gently on very very low heat for about 20 minutes, so the vanilla can infuse the cream. Make sure it does not boil and do not stir either during this stage. Take the pan from the heat and add the sugar, and stir to make sure it all dissolves in the cream. Let the mixture cool to room temperature.

Beat the butter with an electric mixer to a very creamy substance and keep mixing while you add the cream/sugar mixture slowly to the butter substance.

If the mixture starts to split do not panic. The mixture is too cold and you can warm it a little bit ‘au bain marie’. If it looks too thin; the mixture is too hot and you can cool it in a bowl of ice cold water while beating the mixture to the right thick creamy consistency.

Fill a piping bag with a wide round nozzle with the truffle filling and make little worm like shapes (about 3cm long) on a tray lined with grease proof paper and put them in the freezer for about 45 minutes until hard.

Now take 10 fillings at a time from the freezer and coat them with a thin layer of one by one in a bowl of warm (38 °C) chocolate and lay them carefully in a tray filled with a layer of cocoa powder. Wait (a few minutes) until the chocolate is hard enough to roll the truffles around in the cocoa powder to coat them completely. Shake off any excess cocoa powder with the help of a sieve and put them in the fridge for storage. If you want to keep them longer, put them in the freezer.

Enjoy the fantastic ‘bite’ of the dark chocolate cover and the comforting smoothness of the creamy filling!