Vegan Truffles

For the last two weeks I've been going chocolate crazy. Generally speaking this is a winter problem for me. Every single day, from the end of November until the beginning of April I eat a one hundred gram bar of 70% + chocolate. As a kid I wasn't too gone on chocolate. Hershey's candy bars are horrible. They have a distinct poo smell, honestly they really do, it put me off. My chocolate consumption goes way up during the winter, maybe I need more vitamin D. The weather hasn't been great so maybe I need some sun. A friend of mine told me, her husband is vegan, and trying to impress her, I said that I had a vegan truffle recipe. I did, however, I had completely forgotten it. As a result, I've spent many hours toiling over this recipe. Often desserts that include soy products (other than the milk) taste way too soyish. I have seen other recipes for vegan truffles that use only cocoa powder and agave syrup or cocoa powder and vegan spread and they aren't sinful enough. Truffles are so easy to make, unless you're one of those people who wants to be a home chocolatier, tempering your chocolate etc. The truffle mix or ganache can be used as a yummy frosting on cakes, or you can pipe the ganache into cooked pastry cases for chocolate tarts. I like to have a jam jar filled with ganache in the fridge, when people come over you can set out chopped nuts, coconut, toasted oats, or chocolate powder and everyone can dip spoons full of ganache into whichever coating they like. I'm saying this like I do it the whole time, sometimes I do, more often than not I eat spoonsful of the stuff straight from the fridge.

About six months ago on one of my jaunts to the health food shop I noticed soy cream and soy whipping cream. I go to the health food shop for sort of new age snake oil merchant gear like; Honeygar, that crap. Biweekly I convince myself that something I've read in Heat magazine or in Wikipedia is the answer to what ails me. I find myself at Healthwise up to my elbows in lentils, and the next thing I know I've just spent thirty Euro on soysages and a home sprouting kit. I really love health food junk food So bad for you but you can talk yourself into believing it's healthy, yummy lies!!!!Anyways, I saw the soy cream and bought it. It's really good and truly sinful. I have two different recipes for vegan truffles. All the ingredients should be readily available at the health food shop.

Two Ingredient Truffles

200ml soy whipping cream (Grano Vita make soy whipping cream)

100 grams of 60% + vegan chocolate


Cut open your (room temperature) whipping cream before you start. They can be pretty tricky to open. Chop up the chocolate and melt over a double boiler. When the chocolate is melted take off the heat and add the whipping cream. Stir until mixed. Taste, if the ganache isnt sweet enough you can add some agave syrup or maple syrup to sweeten. Put the mixture into a container and refrigerate for 3+ hours. When the ganache is thick and cold you can spoon it into little balls and cover with whatever you fancy. This recipe is good, however, it is soyish.

Orange and Coffee Vegan Truffles

200 gms Orange vegan chocolate chopped (a few drops of orange oil would suffice if this chocolate is unavailable)

200ml Soy pouring cream (Provamil make soy pouring cream, soy whipping cream should work too) room temp

100gms vegan spread

1-2 shots espresso cooled

Melt chocolate over double boiler. When melted, remove from heat and stirrin cream, espresso, and spread. Refridgerate for three hours+ or until firm.