Chilly pepper and white chocolate truffles: the recipe

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I should have posted this recipe last week, long with the chilly pepper post. But sometimes plans do not proceed as thought, in particular when, engrossed by haste and excessive self-confidence, you think to be capable enough to do not need to double check a recipe :P

Here is the story.

I shaped the truffles as usual and I let them rest in the freezer. In the meanwhile, I prepared the white cover chocolate. By looking at it, I realized it was less dense than usual…maybe because it was hot? I let it cool down. Half and hour later, I started to cover the truffles and…what an unpleasant surprise…the cover didn’t solidify. On the contrary, it kept running on the chocolate balls and formed a circulatory net on the parchment paper (see photo of the former post).

Why? What the heck happened? Can I possibly have mistaken the doses? No way! I double checked the recipe and…ahem…I indeed got the recipe wrong, by adding cream that wasn’t necessary at all :P

I guess I learnt my lesson: no matter how convinced you are, always double check your recipes :)

The pair chocolate-chilly pepper is a classical one. Although the mainstream is to go for dark chocolate, I found that chilly pepper gives its best with white chocolates (they actually shouldn’t be defined as chocolate, as they contain no cocoa).

White chocolate contains a higher amount of fats that “wash” capsaicin away. Furthermore, white chocolate is usually added with vanilla that has a buffering effect on the capsaicin.

Chilly pepper and white chocolate truffles

(Doses for 10-15 truffles)

For the truffles

  • 150 g of white chocolate

  • 45 g of cream

  • 15 g of butter

  • 1 table spoon of dulce de leche

For the cover chocolate

  • 200 g of white chocolate

  • 1 tea spoon on ground chilly pepper

Make the truffles:

Bring the cream to boil. Turn the flame off and add the white chocolate. Stir vigorously in order to get a cream. Add the butter and dulce de leche, and keep stirring. Transfer the mixture in the fridge and leave it there for a couple of hours. After this time, take the mixture from the fridge (at this point it should be a semi-solid paste, shapable as a play-dough). Make small balls with your hands and transfer them on a oven pan covered with parchment paper. Transfer the truffles in the freezer and leave them there for half an hour.

Make the cover chocolate:

Melt the white chocolate in a bain-marie or, for impatient people as me, in the microwave. With the aid of a fork, quickly cover each truffle and place it on an oven pan covered with parchment paper. Transfer the truffles into the fridge and leave them there until the chocolate cover will turn solid. Store the truffles in the fridge.