Sluttishly easy: chocolate praline Amaretto truffles

This is one of those "what if...?" recipes.

Recently I was standing in my kitchen, holding a bottle of Amaretto liqueur (let's not get into why) wondering how to top my Belle de Jour Christmas rum truffle recipe.

When all of a sudden a madness took me.

I started throwing everything into the mix: not just Amaretto, but PRALINE too! And not just praline, but dark chocolate AND white chocolate!

When I'd finished and the red mist had cleared, I worried that the end result would be some sort of unholy artery-clogging mess. Which it sort of is. Luckily, however, it is also NOM. And, hopefully obviously, may contain nuts.

You will need

• 100g roasted peeled hazelnuts
• 50g whole almonds
• 165g caster sugar
• 100g dark chocolate
• 50g white chocolate
• 2 tablespoons of Amaretto liqueur
• 150ml double cream
• 25g butter
• 2 teaspoons of cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon of cocoa powder
• Silver leaf to decorate

Make it!

1. Line a baking tray with baking paper.
   
   
2. Chop up the white chocolate and melt it on the hob in a large pan.
   
   
3. In another pan, heat the sugar with half a cup of water, stirring it over a medium heat for about 10 minutes until the sugar boils. You can catch any sugar crystals that have collected on the sides of the pan with a brush dipped in water.
   
   
4. Throw the almonds and hazelnuts into a blender and whizz until they form a sticky paste, then stir them into the caramelised sugar until the pan boils again.
   
   
5. Add the mixture to the melted white chocolate, stir until they've blended then pour onto the baking sheet and refrigerate until the white chocolate/praline mixture cools and hardens (about 20 minutes).
   
   
6. At this time you might want to put your feet up, arm yourself a with a wooden spoon and deal with the remaining white chocolate/praline mixture in the pan. Just sayin'.
   
   
7. Chop up the dark chocolate and melt it in a pan.
   
   
8. Add the cream and butter. After a few minutes, stir in the Amaretto.
   
   
9. Break up the chilled white chocolate/praline mixture and whizz it again in the blender until it appears roughly chopped.
   
   
10. Stir the praline mixture into the melted chocolate, stir for a bit until the praline's a bit, er, integrated, then pour the whole shebang into a bowl and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
    
    
11. You may want to take this opportunity to again clean the sides of the pan with your wooden spoon. Or you may prefer to do your taxes. Whatever floats your boat.
    
    
12. Dust a wooden board with the flour, cinnamon and cocoa powder and empty the silver leaf in to a saucer.
    
    
13. Take heaped teaspoons of the chilled truffle mixture and roll into small balls with your hands. Then roll the balls in the flour, cocoa and cinnamon, then in the silver leaf, and pop into petit-four cases.

And thank your lucky stars that I didn't throw in the kitchen sink as well.


Image by Joey Wan, Flickr.