Things I Eat: Almond Coconut Truffles

I don’t LIKE chocolate. It’s not an allergy thing, I simply don’t like it. This is a very hard concept for most people to understand. However, I can make things with chocolate. Like I did for our Movember Bake Sale.

These truffles are pretty simple to make – they just have a couple steps here and there. They are mostly raw, so, no real baking required. All you need is some type of food processor and two pans to make it. Really.

You can find a lot of recipes like these around the Interwebs. Just look up “raw vegan truffles” or “raw truffles.”

Real truffles require a lot of chocolate and cooking. I don’t have that kind of time. Ina Garten has this recipe which seems pretty. .complicated. Is chocolate worth it for you guys? IDK.

What You Need

• Bittersweet chocolate: I used Ghiradelli because they were the only brand offering bittersweet chocolate. Bittersweet balances the sweet. These contain soy and milk fat. So, not vegan or anything. 
• Unsweetened coconut flakes: Boom. Bob’s Red Mill.
• Coconut oil: This is my binder.
• Medjool Dates: Fantastic! FAAAANNtastic
• Roasted Almonds: I used salted because salt and chocolate go together. You could use cashews or walnuts or even peanuts.
• Unsweetened cocoa powder: Really, I think this is an optional step but it was in a lot of recipes. My kitchen is so coating in cocoa powder it’s amazing.

What You Do
I got a lot of stuff. A lot.

I ended up being able to fit about 5-6 dates into my food processor, ½ cup of almonds and ½ cup unsweetened coconut flakes. I added about a tablespoon of coconut oil as a binder and pulsed that stuff up until it looked like this.

At this point, pretty easy to grab chunks out and roll them into balls with my freshly cleaned hands. The coconut oil will melt a little with the heat of your hands and when it hardens, it will keep everything together. Since it’s all raw stuff, you can taste the mix to see if you want to add anything. You could totally add cinnamon or something.

Roll these little love-nubs into the cocoa powder then pop them into the fridge to set up all nice and good. Doo doo doo. I’ll see you later powdered nubs!

After you have poured yourself a drink or two. . .

Melt up your chocolate. I think people can get fancy-dancey chocolate melters. I just put a small pot into a bigger pot that is filled with water.

You don’t really want the water to boil, but, you do want it to heat up. That will warm the smaller pot and it will melt the chocolate you have sitting in it. BOOM. I also added about a tablespoon of coconut oil because I never understand chocolate and how it operates. Then a little sprinkle of sea salt so that the flavor really comes out. Nothing make sweet SWEET like salt.

I know there are fancy tools to make candy and chocolate dippers. I just used a fork. Pop your little powdered nubs into the melted chocolate and roll ‘em around so they get nice and coated. It’s best if your chocolate is melted but not HOT because it will stick more. Either way, get the nubs all coated. Then move it to a tray with parchment paper or sprayed cooking sheet or – in my case – an unlined, unsprayed cookie sheet and put it into the fridge.

Once it’s all solid – overnight? 30 minutes? IDK how cold your ice box is – you can move the truffles to whatever thing you want to present them on. I just scrapped them off my baking sheet with a spatula. It worked because it was cold.

They were a success! I think the only change I would make is to salt them a little more. Otherwise, my people who think dates are strange and what I make that's raw is weird really liked these guys.

I'm glad I be part of the party!