Day 22 of Countdown to Christmas

It's my turn today and I'm going to show you how to make chocolate truffles and a little gift box to pop them in.

I hope my instructions aren't too long winded!

Ingredients:

200g bar of Bournville chocolate or other good quality dark chocolate chopped in to small pieces

100 ml of double cream

if you want to add some alcohol then you will need a tablespoon of that too.

Decoration

desiccated  coconut

chopped nuts

melted white or milk chocolate

1.  Pour the cream into a pan and heat until almost boiling.  It will bubble around the edges.  Turn off and remove from the heat.

2.  Add the chopped chocolate to the cream and leave for a minute or so.

3.  Stir the chocolate into the cream.  Add your alcohol here if you want it.

4.  Transfer to a bowl and leave to cool then cover with clingfilm and pop in to the fridge for at least a couple of hours until it is set.

5. Take a sheet of baking parchment and place it under a wire cooling rack to catch any drips of chocolate.

6.  Take the mixture out of the fridge and scoop out a teaspoon of the mixture and form into a ball  about the size of a marble and place on the wire rack.  This is a very messy business and you will need to keep washing your hands and probably have to pop the mixture back into the fridge to set again.  They don't have to be perfectly round.

7.  Pop back in the fridge and get your toppings ready.

8. Take out of the fridge and re-roll the balls which will soften them and enable the coconut or the nuts to stick.

If you want to cover them in melted chocolate,leave the chocolate to cool slightly otherwise it will melt your truffle.  

9.  Take a spoon of the melted chocolate and pour over the truffle.  I lost the plot with this and gave up and only managed to do 4 coated in chocolate.  However  I much prefer the ones coated in nuts anyway lol!

10.  Place the finished truffles back in to the fridge until you have made your gift boxes.

These truffles will keep about 3 days and really need to be kept in the fridge.

Gift Box

My finished box measured 4" square.

Most of you will know how to make a box but for those of you who don't, I'll quickly run through the instructions.

Start with 2 pieces of double sided card 8" square.

Trim the piece you want to use for the bottom of the box just a fraction on 2 sides.  This will enable your lid to fit nicely.

Score at 2" on all four sides of both pieces of card.

Cut out a slither as shown above.

Shape into a box and glue the

2 outer squares and fold up the other piece to meet it and hold in place with a couple of pegs.

Do the same for the other side.

Repeat for the lid.

Take a circle punch and punch out a half circle on two opposite sides of the lid to make the box easier to open.

That's it, you're done.  I fit 6 truffles into my box.

See you tomorrow for another great idea from Ali.