These homemade chocolate truffles are extra creamy with the addition of butter. After mixing the 4 ingredients together, let the mixture set in the refrigerator, then roll into balls. Follow this homemade truffles recipe and the helpful video tutorial below!
Making homemade chocolate truffles couldn’t be easier and after watching the video tutorial below, you’ll agree with excitement! They come together faster then even homemade peanut butter eggs. Homemade truffles are the perfect quick & easy treat for holidays and I’m right here to guide you along. Ditch the boxed chocolates!
Chocolate lovers, rejoice. 🙂
Chocolate truffles are a deeply indulgent chocolate treat made from chocolate and cream. They’re essentially balls of chocolate ganache. And great news: they sound so much fancier than they are to make!
If you’re making these around Valentine’s Day, I love coating them in pink and red sprinkles. Pair with Valentine’s Day cookies and Valentine’s Day cupcakes for a trio of epic February 14 treats!
Only 2 Ingredients in Chocolate Truffles
Chocolate and heavy cream are the only ingredients in homemade chocolate truffles. However, I add 2 extra ingredients for texture and flavor. These extras will turn your regular truffles into the BEST CHOCOLATE TRUFFLES. And after writing an entire cookbook on truffles and candy recipes, I know that’s a fact!
- Chocolate: 8 ounces of pure chocolate is the base of chocolate truffles. Do not use chocolate chips because they will not melt into truffle consistency. Chocolate chips are great for recipes like chocolate chip cookies where we want the chips to stay mostly intact, but here want to reach for pure chocolate. Pure chocolate is sold in 4 ounce bars in the baking aisle. Use milk chocolate for sweeter truffles or semi-sweet/dark chocolate for extra rich truffles. If using milk chocolate, reduce the cream to 1/2 cup as milk chocolate is much softer than dark chocolate.
- Heavy Cream: Heavy cream or heavy whipping cream is also a base ingredient. Do not use half-and-half or any other liquid because the truffles won’t set up properly. See recipe note for a non-dairy alternative.
- Butter: 1 scant Tablespoon of softened butter transform these into the creamiest truffles you will ever taste. You will never go back!
- Vanilla Extract: Pure vanilla extract adds exceptional flavor to your chocolate truffles.
With so few ingredients, it’s imperative to follow the recipe. After years of candy making, I find the ratio of 8 ounces of chocolate to 2/3 cup heavy cream is the most favorable. Truffles are too firm with less liquid. Stick to this recipe for truffle success!
How to Make Chocolate Truffles in 5 Steps
- Warm Cream: Pour warm cream over chopped chocolate.
- Do Nothing: Before stirring, let the warm cream and chocolate sit in the bowl for a few minutes. Don’t touch it!
- Stir: Stir until the chocolate is melted.
- Refrigerate: Refrigerate until the mixture is set, about 1-2 hours.
- Roll: Roll into balls and coat in toppings like sprinkles, cocoa powder, or crushed nuts. You can also dip the truffles in melted or tempered chocolate. See my dark chocolate coconut rum truffles post for a video on how to do so. And I have an in-depth explanation for tempered chocolate in Sally’s Candy Addiction if you have a copy.
Sticky Situation: These are extra creamy truffles, which are the most delicious variety. The downside to creamy truffles is that they’re sticky to roll. You can wear rubber gloves or coat your hands in cocoa powder, but here is my #1 trick and it makes rolling SO MUCH EASIER. Scoop the truffle mixture into mounds on a lined baking sheet. (Pictured above.) Refrigerate for 20-30 minutes so the mounds “dry out.” After that, they are a little less sticky to roll. You can watch me do this in the video tutorial.
Troubleshooting Truffles
Even though there are so few ingredients and steps, a couple mishaps can happen. Let me help you troubleshoot through the chocolate truffle recipe.
- The chocolate won’t melt: One trick for successful truffles is to chop the chocolate into very small pieces. The finer the chocolate chunks, the quicker they’ll melt. Additionally, the chocolate might not melt because the cream is not hot enough. Make sure it is simmering warm before pouring over the chocolate. If the chocolate still isn’t melting, place the heat-proof bowl over a pot of 1 inch of simmering water and stir until melted. I usually do this.
- The ganache won’t thicken: Make sure you are using pure chocolate, not chocolate chips, and heavy cream. You can also pour the mixture into a shallow dish so it thickens quicker. And finally, keep it in the refrigerator until thickened.
- The chocolate is greasy and separating: If the truffle mixture is greasy or separating, the heavy cream was too hot.
- The truffle mixture is too sticky: See “Sticky Situation” above.
- Rolled truffles are too dry for toppings: Mash the truffle between your palms and re-roll so it’s sticky enough for the toppings.
By the way, if you love chocolate truffles, you will flip for these peanut butter balls and Oreo balls.
See Your Recipe Success!
Many readers tried this recipe as part of a baking challenge!
Homemade Chocolate Truffles Recipe
- Prep Time: 2 hours, 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 0 minutes
- Total Time: 2 hours, 30 minutes
- Yield: 20-24 truffles
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Shaping
- Cuisine: American
Description
These homemade chocolate truffles are extra creamy with the addition of butter. After mixing the ingredients together, let the mixture set in the refrigerator, then roll into balls. You can coat in your favorite toppings and add lots of fun flavors, too! The mixture gets a little sticky, so refer back to my tips in the blog post above.
Ingredients
- two 4-ounce quality chocolate bars (226g), very finely chopped*
- 2/3 cup (160ml) heavy cream*
- optional: 1 Tablespoon unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- optional: 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- toppings: unsweetened cocoa powder, sprinkles, crushed nuts, melted or tempered chocolate
Instructions
- Place the chocolate in a heat-proof bowl. Set aside.
- Heat the heavy cream until it is simmering. You can heat it on the stove or in the microwave.
- Add the butter, if using, to the chocolate and pour the heavy cream evenly on top. Let the warm cream and chocolate sit for 5 minutes minutes. Add the vanilla extract then stir until the chocolate has completely melted. Place a piece of plastic wrap directly on the surface (to avoid condensation) and refrigerate for 1-2 hours. Tip: Pour into a flat shallow dish, such as a 8×8 inch baking pan, so the mixture evenly and quickly sets.
- Scoop the set truffle mixture into 2 teaspoon-sized mounds. This cookie scoop is the perfect size. For larger truffles, 1 Tablespoon size mounds. Roll each into balls. This gets a little sticky, so see my tips above.
- Roll each into toppings, if desired. Truffles taste best at room temperature!
- Cover tightly and store truffles at room temperature for 3-4 days or in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.
Notes
- Freezing Instructions: For longer storage, freeze up to 3 months with or without toppings. Thaw in the refrigerator, then bring to room temperature, if desired, before enjoying.
- Make Ahead Instructions: Prepare the truffle mixture through step 3. The mixture must chill in the refrigerator for 1-2 hours or up to 3 days. If chilling for longer than 4ish hours, let the mixture sit on the counter for several minutes to soften into scoop-able consistency.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Glass Mixing Bowl | Small Cookie Scoop | 8×8 Pan (optional but helpful when chilling the chocolate mixture)
- Chocolate: Use pure chocolate, the kind sold in 4 ounce bars in the baking aisle. Do not use chocolate chips. The higher quality chocolate you purchase, the better your truffles will taste. I love Baker’s or Ghirardelli brands. If you want to splurge, Scharffen Berger is exceptional! Semi-sweet or dark chocolate make a very intense chocolate truffle and milk chocolate yields a sweeter truffle. If using milk chocolate, reduce the cream to 1/2 cup as milk chocolate is much softer than dark chocolate. Do not use white chocolate in this recipe because it’s too thin. Here is a white chocolate truffles recipe to use instead. You can leave out the lime flavoring.
- Heavy Cream: Heavy cream or heavy whipping cream is the only liquid that will melt the chocolate into the proper truffle consistency. Do not use half-and-half or milk. The only non-dairy substitute is canned full-fat coconut milk (not the refrigerated kind). Shake it up and use in the recipe as you would heavy cream.
- Butter and Vanilla Extract: Both are optional, but butter makes truffles extra creamy and vanilla extract adds wonderful flavor.
- Flavors: Instead of vanilla extract, use 1/2 teaspoon or 1 teaspoon (depending how strong of a flavor you want) raspberry, coconut, orange, peppermint, or strawberry extract. Or leave out the extract and add 1-2 Tablespoons of your favorite liqueur. I also have hazelnut truffles and key lime truffles recipes too!
- Halved/Doubled: Recipe can easily be halved, but I do not recommend doubling. Instead, make 2 separate batches.
Keywords: chocolate truffles
If my Baking bar has no sugar in it, when and how do I add it?
Hi Sara, you can usually taste the sugar granules when using unsweetened chocolate + adding sugar to the mix. Unfortunately, we don’t have a successful solution for you but let us know if you test anything. We always have the best luck using semi-sweet chocolate here.
Hi Sally – can these be made in a chocolate mold? Or are they too sticky to get out of the mold? I was thinking of tempering some chocolate to line the inside of the molds and then pouring the truffle mixture into the molds. What do you think?
Hi Alison! If you line the molds with tempered chocolate, this truffle mixture would be great as the filling inside. Let me know if you try it.
Sally, I did end up trying it yesterday and it came out beautifully! They are so delicious! I plan to make another batch next weekend. 🙂 thanks for the great recipe!
★★★★★
Thank you for this recipe, I made them and left them outside of the fridge during the night and it seemed the texture has become like sand- the flavor is great but grainy??? The were in a sealed counter. The ones in the fridge where perfect. Why would this be? Thank u
Your recipe is so delicious.I have tried it it tasted so yummy.
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HI there, am wondering if you have any recipes for white chocolate truffles? would your ratio of 8oz chocolate – 2/3 cup cream still work?
Hi Kandace, for white chocolate truffles, we recommend following this recipe instead. You can leave out the lime flavoring.
Sally, just want you to know… your recipes are far above anyone else’s. When searching for a particular recipe, I look until I see yours. If I don’t find yours, I make up my own. Keep doing what you do, because it’s awesome!!
Angela
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Hi Sally. I’m from the Uk and I can’t find any of the creams mentioned. We have double cream which I understand is the equivalent. It is richer with a higher butter fat content. Will this do? Will I need to take away butter. Please help 😀
Hi Sally
I’ve made your pumpkin spice and PB truffles with great success thanks to all of your tips and great recipes!
I am wondering if I can dip these chocolate truffles in white chocolate?
thanks for all of your great recipes,
Hi Marilyn, yes you can dip these truffles in white chocolate. It will get a little messy though.
I’m ok with messy as long as it’s only during the process :-0
thanks Sally
New Zealand commenter: Superb. Made a batch with cream – delicious. Have now tried with coconut cream – also delicious, though they are a bit softer than the cream ones (to the point of being slightly messy to eat!). Recipe worked perfectly. Both times I used Nestle Baker’s Choice cooking chocolate – dark chocolate – which melted really well. As this chocolate comes in 200g cakes (not 226g), I reduced the quantity of coconut cream by about 10% to keep ratio right, rather than starting a second cake. Thank you so much – these are as good as the French truffles that I love but are pretty near impossible to buy in NZ.
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I made these today
Rolled them in coconut
Cocoa powder and crushed nuts
What a delightful recipe
Thank you
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These were so simple to make and tasted amazing!
We followed the recipe exactly and they were delicious. Used milk chocolate so used less cream. The hot cream did not melt the chocolate, I think I was worried about heating the cream too much. I needed to put the bowl of cream and chocolate over a double boiler for a couple minutes, stirring continuously. Really helped to smooth out the chocolate.
My young niece made these so we used fun toppings. We rolled in peppermint crumbs, Oreo crumbs, freeze dried strawberries powdered, and sprinkles. We can’t wait to make again.
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I made these for Valentine’s Day and had a couple of issues. First I added butter and it separated from the chocolate when they cooled. The other issue is the chocolate looks lumpy but it’s not…there are no lumps but I don’t have a smooth shiny surface after adding the hot cream and waiting.
I wonder if using an immersion mixer would help both of these issues.
Thoughts!
Thanks!
Connie
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Hey these are awesome! made these tonight for my bf on Sunday will they still be as great in 4 days? I have stored them in a food container in the fridge. I Coated mine in milk chocolate.
Hi Sally,
One question: when you say pure dark chocolate, does that mean using pure 100% (ie. unsweetened) chocolate? Or should I be sticking to semi/bittersweet like you also mention?
Looking forward to making these! I’ve enjoyed all of your recipes I’ve tried.
Hi Jacob, by the word pure, I mean real chocolate and not chocolate chips or a chocolate product (such as chocolate flavored almond bark or candy melts). I recommend semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate and you can find it in the baking aisle.
Hi, I’m just an amateur baker who has done a decent amount of gluten-free baking over the years, but I can answer your question. The main ingredients listed in this recipe (chocolate, cream, butter, vanilla extract) are naturally gluten-free ingredients. Keeping this in mind, you should still always read the labels for all ingredients before creating anything for someone with Celiac disease or another gluten-intolerance, just to be sure!
Hello! If I purchased chocolate candy bars will that work? (Cadbury, Lindt) thank you!
Hi Kate, those should be fine.
These are delicious!! And so easy! Thank you for the great recipe!!
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Can a tablespoon of coconut oil go in instead of butter?
Hi Allison, some readers have made that substitution with no problem. I do recommend butter if you can use it, though.
Do they need to be refrigerated after they are made? Or can they be wrapped individually and left in a cool room?
I had the same problem, would appreciate some assistance also on this.
How do you get them to stay set, unless mine stay in the fridge they don’t stay set, the ganache is firm but if you leave them out of the fridge they just turn to mush.
Any chance you have a recipe for adding champagne to them so I could make champagne truffles for New Years? Let me know, thank you!
Hi Gaby! I don’t, but that sounds delicious. I would try finding another recipe tested with the champagne addition.
Hey, I dont know about adding champagne, but you could definitely use the edible sparkles that are fine, like a mixture oof gold and silver too coat your gnache balls and that would make them very sparkley and “champagne like” and then you could call them champagne truffles. 🙂
Hi, I made these with whipping cream last time (35% fat) and they were perfect! but I’m struggling to get any whipping cream now! Would double cream work? It’s 48%, would this effect the consistency at all? It’s the only cream I can find in the shops at the moment
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I made these for the first time and not only were they really fun and easy to make they were also delicious. They didn’t last more than 24 hours in my house! Going to make them again but try out some different liquors/extracts. Thank you for this recipe!
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Well…I guess my cream was too hot and ganache did not set up properly.
I’ve tried various ways to get it to that nice smooth consistency (mixer/heating gently, etc.,)
‘gave up’ – now in fridge to get ready for truffle making.
Have I totally messed up? I hate to throw out all the expensive chocolate! Help!!
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Hi Sherri, I’m just now seeing this question, but hope I can help troubleshoot if you decide to make them again! The ganache will be in more of a liquid state before it goes in the refrigerator. Is this how yours was? Did it set up after refrigeration?
Also, what type of chocolate did you use? Make sure you are using pure chocolate (not chips) and if you were using milk chocolate you would need to reduce the cream to 1/2 cup. Let us know how they turned out!
I am waiting to see if mine will set up properly or not. I hope you didn’t waste the chocolate! I am thinking of ways to use the ganache, just in case …
Sally, I have dark chocolate couverture and was wondering what I should be doing differently?
Are they perhaps directly replaceable with “quality chocolate bars” that you use in this recipe?
Hi Joyce, somehow I’m just seeing your comment/question now. My apologies on the delay responding to you! Though I haven’t tested it, some readers have used couverture chocolate in this recipe as a 1:1 replacement with no other changes. However since it contains a little more cocoa butter, I would consider reducing the heavy cream a bit– perhaps to 1/2 cup (120ml).
Can you add cream cheese along with the heavy cream to these truffles to get that flavour?
Do you have any variation of this recipe that incorporates Oreos? We love making Oreo cream cheese truffles and wanted to make them for teachers this year. However, we are worried to do so due to the refrigeration needs because of the cream cheese. Is there a way to incorporate Oreos into this truffle recipe or any other that you may have? Thank you
Hi Ashley! You could try coating these truffles in ground Oreo cookies instead of sprinkles. Incorporating Oreos would require additional recipe testing.
Not sure what the issue is. i used homemade dark chocolate. it was a bit soft, so i added 2/3 of the 2/3. cream and liqueur. it was a large batch, unintentionally, i meant to do half at a time, but it is in a large bowl and less than an inch thick. been 3 hours in the fridge and the only thing that thickened was a thin layer of the crust. the rest is still soup. how might i thicken that back up again?
Second batch turned out perfectly, had about 1/2 a cup or so too much cream in the first batch which was it was it was still soupy, but i am able to salvage it as a dip for crackers or pretzels or fruit, etc… so, all in all, both batches actually turned out excellent!
Hello, I have Callebeaut callets (semi-sweet, milk and white). They are 3 drop viscosity, which Callebeaut says is good for all applications. Do you think these will work?
Hi Celeste, They are pure chocolate so they should work! See the recipe note #3 about reducing the cream if you use milk chocolate and an alternate recipe for the white chocolate.
What if you wanted to make like peppermint truffles would you make everything the same and then add peppermint extract to the base? Or would that mess it up
Hi Stephanie, Yes you could add peppermint extract to these without changing the recipe. Or you can follow the recipe for these Dark Chocolate Peppermint Truffles (which makes a larger batch!).