Friday, 14 January 2011

Christmas Leftover recipes -1. Nigellas Christmas Pudding Truffles

Well as someone has requested recipes, I thought I'd start with a series on using those Christmas leftovers. I don't know about you, but I always seem to end up with a spare Christmas pudding, 1/2 a jar of mincemeat (no, I don't make my own!) and various chocolates, so heres recipes 1.

Ingredients
  • 125g best-quality dark chocolate, finely chopped
  • 350g leftover, or freshly cooked and cooled, Christmas pudding
  • 60ml sherry
  • 2 x 15ml tablespoons golden syrup
      FOR DECORATION:
  • 100g white chocolate, finely chopped
  • 6 red glacĂ© cherries
  • 6 green glacĂ© cherries
1 Line a baking sheet (that will fit in the fridge) with clingfilm, baking parchment, or  foil and set it to one side while you make the bonbons.
2 Melt the dark
chocolate
in a heatproof bowl suspended above a pan of simmering water, or in the microwave according to the manufacturer's guidelines.

3 Crumble the cold Christmas pudding into a bowl, add the sherry and golden syrup and stir till all is incorporated.

4 Pour in the melted dark chocolate and stir again: this will make the mixture much more sticky.

5 To make this step easier you could use those disposable gloves, but a little vegetable oil on your hands works too, pinch out small lumps of mixture and roll so that you have little rounds about the size of a chocolate truffle. You should get about 30 out of this mixture; fight the impatient urge to make these balls larger as you go.

6 Cover with clingfilm and slot into the fridge to firm up.
You don’t need to decorate these, especially if at this time of the year Christmas seems a distant memory, but they are super cute when decorated.

7
To decorate, melt the white chocolate either in a heatproof bowl suspended over a pan of simmering water, or in the microwave, then let it cool for about 5 minutes, to make it easier to work with, while you chop the red cherries into small pieces (like berries), and snip the green cherries, to represent leaves.

8 Using a teaspoon, drip a little of the melted but slightly cooled white chocolate on each truffle, then arrange the sticky pieces of cherry on top (a cocktail stick helps stop getting your fingers sticky when doing this).

9 Eat!

Next time: Mincemeat Muffins.

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