A foray into chocolate (Sesame truffles)

About a year ago, I had the great idea to do truffles for this blog.  It didn't happen.  I'm not really sure what went wrong, but one of the factors that was problematic was the climate.  It's hot and humid in the tropics.  Now that I am in a Northern clime, it is neither of those things.  In fact, it is quite cold, and don't get me started on how dry the air is!  I figured it was time to try again.  I used Valentine's Day as my excuse. (Yes, that was about a month ago.  Problem?)  I actually made two different truffles, but for simplicity's sake, I'm breaking them up into two blogs, focusing on different techniques in each.

Truffles are really popular, but they're not always truly truffles.  A truffle is made from the inside out, and so the center, while soft, is firm enough to hold its shape.  This center is called ganache.  Ganache is basically a chocolate emulsion.  It can be thick, like in truffles, or creamy, like a cake frosting, or thinner, like the frosting on a donut.  Cool, but maybe you're not really sure what an emulsion is.  An emulsion is a mixture of liquids that don't usually mix.  Think of salad dressings.  You know how some separate into 2 layers, but some don't?  Well, that's related to emulsions.  When you shake up the separated one, you create a temporary emulsion.  The non-separated version (assuming it's a vinaigrette) is a stable emulsion, usually obtained by the addition of an emulsifier (a chemical that stabilizes the mixture) or sometimes by processing.  Ever notice the word "homogenized" on your milk?  Go check.  It's probably there (maybe not on skim…).  Milk is an emulsion stabilized by pushing it through a small (like, microscope small) space, breaking up the fat globules that are what milk is, making them smaller so that they can stay trapped in the watery part of milk.  That's why people talk about cream rising-- it's the fatty part of non-homogenized milk floating out of the emulsion.

But back to chocolate…  You create the ganache emulsion by adding hot liquids to your chocolate.  You DON'T melt the chocolate.  By using the heat of the liquid to melt it, you're ensuring that everything is homogeneously mixed and a stable mixture is formed.  You're suspending the chocolate solids into a delightful, creamy mass, keeping it from setting hard.

I found my truffle recipes in Making Artisan Chocolates, by Andrew Garrison Shotts (ISBN: 9781592533107).  I highly recommend it if you are interested.  He does a great job explaining every part of the process, has a ton of excellent recipes, and does his best to leave you with the tools to expand on your own.  I'll tell you how I made it, but I really, REALLY think it is worth buying the book, because his expertise is far beyond anything I could offer, including invaluable tips.


Before you get started, get a thermometer that is reliable between 85 and 120 degrees; I recommend digital.  You'll probably want a scale, too; I used nothing but metric weights to make my truffles.  The book does provide imperial measurements, but often those are in weight as well.  And you need time.  My goodness!  These things are time-consuming!







Sesame Truffles (from Making Artisan Chocolates)
168g 38%milk chocolate, chopped (I used Green & Black's Organic Milk Chocolate [34%Cacao], which, by the way, is delicious!)
77g heavy cream
7g sesame oil
28g salted butter, cubed and soft, but not melted!
453g 29% white chocolate (I used Ghiradelli white chocolate chips)
190g sesame seeds

Set the chopped-up chocolate in a bowl with room to stir it around.  Heat the cream and oil together in a heavy saucepan over medium-high heat, stirring constantly.  Once it comes to a rolling boil, pour it over the chocolate and let it sit for two minutes (a bit less if your kitchen is frigid).  Gently stir everything together so the chocolate melts.  Check the temperature, and when it gets down to 95˚F (in my kitchen, this was almost instant), add the butter.  Stir well, but not too much.  If you start seeing things separating, your ganache is "breaking".  Stop stirring.  That will make it worse.  Let the ganache sit for a couple hours until it is firm enough to mold (think play-doh consistency).  Scoop out a piece of ganache and roll it into a sphere.  Repeat until all the ganache is used up.  These aren't supposed to be big truffles-- Andrew Garrison Shotts figures about 30, and you've got maybe 2 cups of ganache, if that gives you a reference.  You can make them bigger, I'm sure.  Place your truffle centers on a baking sheet lined with parchment- or waxed-paper, and set them someplace out of the way where they can sit overnight and dry out a little.

When you're ready to finish the truffles, you'll need some melted white chocolate.  The proper way to do this is super-complicated, a process called "tempering", which will be described in depth in my other blog.  I started doing it this way, but got frustrated (you could almost say I lost my temper--haha!).  I decided it didn't matter so much with white chocolate, and I would rather be able to work with it easily and it not look so pretty.  My kitchen was so darn cold I didn't need to worry about the chocolate setting.  So I wound up just [re-]melting the white chocolate.

Dip the truffle centers in the white chocolate, roll them in the sesame seeds, and set them on a baking sheet lined with parchment- or waxed-paper to set.  You can get dipping forks, which have 2 thin tines on which the truffles can rest, or you can be creative with other utensils.  My mom always dipped things in chocolate with chopsticks, so that's what I use to dip my truffles.  The point is that you want as minimal a contact surface as possible.  Dip the chocolates, then roll them in the sesame seeds and place them on a parchment-paper-lined tray to set completely.

Some thoughts:  I think my kitchen was too cold (it temped at ~50˚F), which may have led to a lot of problems.  My ganache did start to break.  Shotts includes in his book a tip for fixing this, but it involves adding [more] corn syrup.  Notice there is no corn syrup in the ganache.  I just stopped stirring.  The ganache set enough that I could work with it, but it lacked the smooth creaminess that my other ganache had.  None of my tasters felt that the texture was off, though.  Or at least they said it wasn't an issue when I asked.  
I did notice that the white chocolate did not set as quickly after I gave up on the temper, so it does make a difference, but it didn't detract from their long-term stability.  It just made them look less polished.