FRIED CHOCOLATE TRUFFLES - The Recipe Place

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Fried Chocolate Truffles

Ingredients

8 ounces whipping cream
16 ounces shaved chocolate
1/2 pound sweet french bread, preferably stale
1 Tablespoon cinnamon
1/4 Cup sugar
1/2 Cup all-purpose flour (for dusting)
3 eggs, beaten

Directions

1. The Ganache
Bring the cream to a slight boil, and slowly mix in the shaved chocolate, stirring well. When it achieves a homogeneous consistency, put it into the freezer. Every thirty minutes give it a quick stir to keep it from separating. It's "done" when it is the consistency of modeling clay - it took about three hours in my freezer.

2. Forming the truffles
Line a half-sheet pan with waxed paper and begin to form the ganache into small balls, about 3/4 inch diameter and arrange them on the sheet pan. Put them back into the freezer for about an hour -- while you were working them, the chocolate began to melt and they must be stiff for the next step.

3. Prepare the bread-crumbs
You will want the bread very dry for this -- if you have fresh bread, slice it very thin and place it in a barely-warm oven for ten minutes until it feels stale. Use a food processor to grind the bread into crumbs, adding the sugar and cinnamon. You're looking for the consistency of kosher-salt here.

4. Coat the truffles
Set three bowls out across your work surface, left-to-right (if you're right handed) - in the first bowl you'll have the flour; in the second bowl, the beaten eggs, and in the third bowl, put about a quarter of the bread crumbs. As you progress, the crumbs will become contaminated with the eggs, so you'll want to freshen them with dry crumbs from the stock.

Using your left hand, take a piece of the ganache and roll it in the flour, and drop it into the egg. With your right hand, coat well with the egg, and transfer it to the bread-crumbs. Coat well and transfer to another half-sheet tray covered with waxed paper. After all the balls have been coated, repeat the process - flour, egg, bread-crumbs. At the end of the second coating they should be almost the size of a golf-ball. Back into the freezer for at least an hour, or even overnight. If you're going to keep them longer than that, put them on layers of waxed paper in a air-tight container.

5. Fry
Put enough oil into your fryer and bring it to 375 deg F. I fry two at a time. Transfer the cold truffles into the oil and let them fry for almost a whole minute -- the coating will be golden brown and slightly hard (the sugar will be nicely caramelized). Dry on paper-towels. Serve them still hot.