Chocolate. Even the word looks delicious.
Chocolate gets a bad rep for causing weight gain, acne, and a boatload of other ailments. Sure, when you cram a cup of sugar into each bar, that’ll run you into some problems. If you put poison into an apple and ate it, would you blame the apple? Real chocolate is full of fat, fiber, antioxidants, iron, magnesium copper, manganese and other minerals. It also helps reduce blood pressure and improves brain function, among many other benefits.
I’ve been a chocolate lover since I was a child. I could eat 10 king-sized Hershey bars throughout the day and go to sleep happy. One of the greatest things that happened once I started eating keto was my taste buds changing. I became so sensitive to sugar that even the darkest chocolate I indulge in now tastes as amazing as sugary, milk chocolate did. Trader Joe’s has some amazing 85% cacao dark chocolate. I also enjoy Taza Chocolate, it’s a little hard to find and pricey, but it’s so pure! It contains two ingredients: organic cacao beans and (just a little) organic cane sugar. You can’t get better chocolate!
We had company over for dinner one night and I decided to make things easier for myself and make dessert ahead of time. I also decided to go with something more subtle and grown-up- homemade truffles. With just a hint of sweetness and over the top richness, these homemade truffles are easy to make, store very well and impress the pants off anyone. I made them the night before and could’ve kept them in the freezer for a month (not that they would’ve lasted). It goes without saying, they went very quickly and I sat there wishing I’d made 50 of them to store for emergencies. Learn from my mistakes 😉
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If you want to keep this ultra low carb, consider using Stevia sweetened chocolate like Lily’s brand and sweeten with erythritol. I’d suggest dissolving the erythritol in the warm cream to ensure the truffles are nice and smooth inside.
And if you’re strictly paleo and don’t eat/drink heavy cream, consider adding a well-blended avocado to act as a creamy binder in this recipe! Or opt for the usual, naturally dairy-free, coconut cream.
Variations
You can keep the recipe nice and simple and use the bare essentials: chocolate, sweetener, and cream.
In my recipe I added vanilla to contrast the deep chocolate flavors, cinnamon to add warmth and some kick, and salt to bring out the sweetness. Consider adding mint, or orange zest, more salt or even chili! Let’s face it, chocolate goes well with anything. Chocolate covered bacon anyone?
As for the coating, I used cocoa powder, but you can also use crushed nuts (finely crushed, and pressed on the surface while the truffles aren’t too hard), shredded coconut, or just dip them into a different type of chocolate! Drizzle these homemade truffles with peanut butter, coconut butter, or white chocolate for extra impress points.
Next time I make these, you better believe I’m adding some nuts to the center!
| Servings: truffles |
- 1/2 cup heavy cream
- 150 grams 85% dark chocolate
- 2 tbsp grass fed butter
- 2 tbsp So Nourished Keto Pancake Syrup (or sugar-free sweetener to taste)
- 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 1 pinch sea salt
- 2 tbsp raw cocoa powder
- Begin by heating cream on a low flame but don't let it boil. Start to chop your chocolate bars into small pieces.
- When it's simmering, add chopped chocolate to the cream and stir until combined. Add the butter in as well and stir until completely melted.
- Turn the heat off and add pancake syrup, vanilla, cinnamon, and salt. Stir to combine.
- Let the mixture refrigerate for about an hour. You may need to stir every once in a while to ensure the butter is well distributed; it has a tendency of separating.
- Once it's cool and hardened in the refrigerator, you can scoop some truffle batter up and roll it into a small ball, about an inch and a half in diameter. You can of course make them smaller or bigger to your liking.
- Place each round ball onto a plate lined with wax or parchment paper and refrigerate for about 30 minutes.
- Once they've hardened some more, you can give them another quick roll in your hands to smooth them out.
- Place cocoa powder in a deep bowl and add your truffles. Shake and roll the truffles gently in the cocoa powder to coat them evenly.
- Put the truffles in an airtight container and refrigerate until ready to serve. Garnish with a sprig of mint and enjoy with hot tea!
If you use a sugar free alternative to honey, your truffles will be even lower in carbs!
Loved this recipe? Let us know! Something didn’t quite turn out right? Ask us in the comments below or contact us– we respond to comments every day and would love to hear from you and help you out! And check out all our desserts to learn to make more delicious and healthy meals!
NUTRITIONAL DISCLAIMER
The content on this website should not be taken as medical advice and you should ALWAYS consult with your doctor before starting any diet or exercise program. We provide nutritional data for our recipes as a courtesy to our readers. We use Total Keto Diet app software to calculate the nutrition and we remove fiber and sugar alcohols, like erythritol, from the total carbohydrate count to get to the net carb count, as they do not affect your blood glucose levels. You should independently calculate nutritional information on your own and not rely on our data. The website or content herein is not intended to cure, prevent, diagnose or treat any disease. This website shall not be liable for adverse reactions or any other outcome resulting from the use of recipes or recommendations on the Website or actions you take as a result. Any action you take is strictly at your own risk.
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We believe that the key to success is simplicity and satisfaction with your diet. That’s why we created Dessert in Five – 30 low carb dessert recipes all using just 5 ingredients and 5 net carbs or fewer!
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Dr. Rosmy Barrios, MD is an aesthetic medicine specialist whose work focuses on patients who are treated for obesity, metabolic syndrome, and other weight-related issues through nutritional analysis, keto diet programs, and supporting medications.
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Do you think maple syrup or coconut sugar would work instead of the honey? My husband isn’t a big fan of honey.
I think maple syrup would work since it’s similar in consistency but honey is really best. If you’re trying to make these low carb, a great substitute for honey is the Sukrin syrups. They’re the same consistency as honey and quite sweet!
I’d like to try this recipe again and was wondering what you thought or if you’ve tried using a no sugar added dark chocolate like Lily’s, sweetened with stevia? Maybe half Lily’s and half 85% dark chocolate. That and using Sukrin syrup would really bring the carbs down.
Thank you for your help.
Roye
You can definitely do that! We were aiming for a more paleo & keto truffle here, but your ideas can definitely work. There are a lot of variations on truffles that would be fantastic to try.
Thank you Vicky, I’m doing the Keto diet, the less carbs the better :).
Don’t we know it! Let us know how they turn out, we’d love to know 🙂
I tried this recipe again using Lily’s Dark Chocolate w/Amonds and the Sukrin clear syrup. They came out great and I tried to do the net carbs :). Dont’ hold me to it but what I came up with was total recipe 44.30g net carbs (I got 15 truffles) so 44.30 divided by 15 = 3g net carbs. They weren’t quite sweet enough for me so before forming the balls I added a few drops of Stevia liguid.
Everything sounds great! We love Lily’s chocolate bars.
Thank you Rami. Just to be clear, I forgot to mention (I’m sorry) that I used one bar of Lily’s and one bar of Ghirardelli 86% 3.17 oz dark chocolate bar.
I tried this and it was not successful at all. My chocolate never got smooth, was totally small lumps AND never got hard, I couldn’t roll them at all. I don’t know what I did wrong. I used Ghirardelli 86% chocolate and Torani sugar free vanilla syrup instead of honey?
It sounds like you got some liquid in the chocolate while it was melting. You have to make sure the utensils you’re using are super dry, any water will cause the chocolate to seize up and ruin the consistency. Perhaps the Torani syrup contained too much water for the chocolate. If you try again, please let us know how it turned out!
OK, thank you, I didn’t notice any water but I wasn’t looking and didn’t know that would ruin the chocolate. Maybe I’ll try something other than the Torani syrup next time.
And BTW, I’m still eating the truffles, they’re a little flat, not round but still good :).
Thank you for your reply.
Good to hear they’re still tasty 🙂
Just an FYI for anyone wanting to use Torani sugar free syrup. I checked the ingredients and the very first one was purified water! Oops. Guess that caused the issues. Will try something else next time.
Thank you both for your replies and comments.
This actually sounds like a real truffle recipe. I make my own chocolate, so this would be really good. Most of the ones I’ve seen just use coconut oil. I get plenty of that in my fudge!
This is my absolute favorite and easy dessert. I want to share with you one thing I did differently. After melting the ingredients, I put the pot into a large bowl with ice and stirred until it was chilled and the butter was mixed in. The chocolate started to harden, so it didn’t take long in the refrigerator to cool it the rest of the way. I had to use stevia/erythritol blend to bring down the carb/sugar load. Next time I make these, I am going to add in some finely chopped nuts, maybe a mix of pecans and walnuts, raw of course. I made much smaller balls, and 1 or 2 of them took care of my chocolate fix. As a compliment, my daughter said these were every bit as good as the French chocolate truffles I used to buy before I went keto! Thank you for your great recipe!
Thanks for the tip! And we’re so honored your daughter said that 🙂 I hope you both keep enjoying them and all the different variations you come up with!
Hello, I was wondering how much Erythritol you recommend we add in place of honey? I have it in granulated, powered, and liquid form, so i’m also wondering which form you recommend we use? Thanks!
Hey Michelle! I would try 2 tbsp as well. These truffles are meant to be rich and a bit bitter, like dark chocolate should be enjoyed!
Though, if you’ve heard of the brand Sukrin, I recommend trying their low carb, high fiber syrup. It’s very similar in taste to honey! It would add the thick consistency and the stickiness that helps keep the truffles together.
We didn’t know about them when we made these truffles 🙂
Hi. You don’t say how much chocolate you use in weight? I want to use a different type, so it would be handy to know the weight in grams if possible?
Hey Ruth, it says “150 grams” in the ingredients section 🙂