Sugar High Fridays 13: The Dark Side - Coffee Chocolate Truffle Two Ways

Loveschool is hosting this edition of Sugar High Fridays, and finally, finally, finally - the theme is dark chocolate. I bet many more than myself have been waiting for this one.

I chose to make a dark chocolate truffle, flavored with coffee. Because, come on - what's darker than dark chocolate? That's right, coffee. I then used the truffle for two things. Above, you can see hazelnut macarons with coffee chocolate truffle filling. (And I know, my macarons are lacking a lot - I know. They still tasted good, but.. the shape plain sucks. *sigh* I used the recipe Nigella has for pistachio macarons, from How to be a Domestic Goddess, and just substituted hazelnuts. If anyone wants to give it a try...)



My other creation was very successful - dark chocolate muffins with truffle filling. Yum! I brought these to the cat show too, and they disappeared very fast. In the picture, some have white dots - these are mint chocolate candies that I used instead of truffle for a few muffins: I ran out.

Now, to the recipes!

Coffee Chocolate Truffle

130 g cream (full fat)
250 g dark chocolate (I like Chocovic, just use your favorite)
40 g honey
12 g coffee beans

Chop the chocolate, put in a bowl. Roughly crush your beans with a pestle and mortar. Bring the cream to a boil, pour over the beans and let it steep for five minutes. Strain the cream back into the pot (make sure to press down on the beans to get maximum flavor) and add the honey. Bring to a boil, again. Pour over the chocolate, and stir until smooth and elastic. Let cool in room temperature. (If you want, you can add a little bit of butter at the end, too.)

Dark Chocolate Muffins with a Truffle Center
makes 20 small muffins

2 1/4 dl flour (a scant cup)
1 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
1,5 dl cacao (1/2 cup + 2 tbsp)
1,25 dl sugar (1/2 cup)
65 g butter, melted
100 ml milk
1 egg

Truffle as above, scooped into 20 small pieces and placed in the freezer

Preheat the oven to 175 degrees C. Get out your muffin cups. I used pretty small ones, since these are very rich muffins. Mix all the dry ingredients. Beat the egg with the milk, and add the butter. Add this to the dry ingredients. Stir well, and divide in your cups - they shouldn't be more than half-filled. Add a piece of truffle to each one, press down well.

Bake for 10-15 minutes - check for doneness and make sure to not let the truffle burn!