Dairy Free Chocolate Truffles

Hands up chocoholics!

These little beauties are so simple to make but SO delicious and they make a perfect gift too if you don't eat them all yourself first!

Dairy-free Essential Oil Infused Chocolate Truffles

To make the truffle base you will need:
300g dairy free dark chocolate
240ml coconut cream

Place the chocolate and coconut cream in a pan and melt gently over low heat. When stirred it will come together and be thick, creamy and luscious. Divide mixture into 3 bowls, add the essential oils and mix-ins then leave in the fridge for around 4 hours to set before rolling into balls.

Variation 1:
Add 1/2 cup finely chopped dried cranberries and 5 drops doTERRA Wild Orange essential oil. Once set, roll in cocoa powder and store in the fridge.

Variation 2:
Add 2 drops doTERRA Lime essential oil and 2 drops doTERRA Black Pepper essential oil. Once set, roll in toasted coconut and store in the fridge.

Variation 3:
Add 2 drops doTERRA Cardamom essential oil and 2 drops doTERRA Ginger essential oil. Once set, roll in crushed pistachios and store in the fridge.

If you haven't experimented with essential oils to flavour your food yet, you're missing out! Just a couple of drops adds amazing flavour and can transform any dish into something extraordinary.

These truffles make the perfect gift. If you don't eat them all yourself!

Which flavour combo do you like the sound of?

I only use and recommend doTERRA essential oils. See why here!

Cranberry, White Chocolate & Pistachio Cookies

These cookies just shout Christmas to me! They're red, white and green and packed with Christmassy flavours. I always make cookies to give as Christmas gifts because they are so transportable and always so well received.  Every year I say I should make more cookies and fewer chocolate-y things because of the heat but it never happens!

These are the sort of cookies with so many mix-ins you wonder how they will stay together. Then you make them and they're perfect, crunchy on the outside, chewy in the middle and packed with little surprises. Oh and they make the house smell amazing :)

Cranberry, White Chocolate and Pistachio Cookies
Recipe adapted from Brown Eyed Baker

1¼ cups plain flour
½ ts baking powder
½ ts baking soda
¼ ts salt
120g butter, at room temperature
½ cup light brown sugar
½ cup white sugar
1 large egg
1 ts vanilla extract
½ cup rolled oats
½ cup roasted salted pistachios, chopped
1 cup white chocolate chips
1 cup dried cranberries

Preheat oven to 190 / 170 degrees fan-forced. Line 2 trays with baking paper and set aside.

Whisk together the flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda in a medium bowl.

Using an electric mixer beat the butter and both sugars until light and fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until well combined. Carefully mix in the dry ingredients then using a spatuala, fold through the oats, pistachios, cranberries and white chocolate.

Roll the dough into balls and place onto prepared trays, allowing room for spreading. Flatten the top of each biscuit with your fingers then bake for approx 10 minutes or until slightly golden on top. Allow to cool on the trays for 5 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool to room temperature. Store in an airtight container.

Makes approx 30.

Tim Tam Balls

It seems I have been missing out because I hadn't even heard of these little beauties until last week!

Apparently they are the most popular recipe on the Stay At Home Mum blog and I can see why. I mean everyone loves tim tams and having them in ball form makes them even more appealing. But be warned, you won't be able to stop at one!

These are just one of the tasty little homemade morsels our family and friends will be receiving this year. I will also be making my famous Rum Balls, mini Christmas Cakes and Peanut Butter squares as well as a few other things which I will post soon.

This is half the original recipe which you will find here on Stay At Home Mum.

Tim Tam Balls

1 packet of Tim Tams, any flavour
125g cream cheese (1/2 a block) at room temperature
1 cup dessicated coconut OR hundreds & thousands

Place the tim tams into the food processor and blitz until they turn into crumbs. Add the cream cheese and pulse until the mixture forms a clump around the blade. Roll teaspoonfuls of mixture into balls and then roll in the coconut or hundreds & thousands (I did 1 batch of each). Makes approx 20. Chill until ready to serve.

Christmas Baking Craziness

I know I'm not alone in overcommiting before Christmas. I love to make lots of homemade goodies for the family and to give as gifts and between all that and regular baking and bringing cakes etc for Christmas parties I will be spending many, many hours in the kitchen!

This is what I am making this year:

- 2 x christmas cakes (one is gluten free this year for my dad)
- a full-size traditional steamed plum pudding
- a batch of mini fruitcakes
- a peach tart
- a chocolate marquise cake
- choc peanut butter slice
- cranberry cookies
- chocolate peanut butter cheesecake
- a frozen christmas pudding
- sugar cookies to decorate with the kids

I know in a few years that list will blow out even further when we'll be baking gifts for teachers too.

We are having a Christmas eve dinner at our place for close family this year and have finally decided on a menu. I'll be doing a pineapple and brown sugar glazed ham, a boneless, butterflied roast turkey, potato bake and salads with plum pudding and custard for dessert. Yum!

And then we'll be rocking up to do it all again on Christmas Day AND Boxing Day!

Luckily Christmas only happens once a year!

What are you baking this year?

Individual Rum Christmas Cakes

I have to confess, I am one of those people. Those people who actually like fruitcake! There is a lot of anti-fruitcake sentiment out there, particularly at this time of year, but around here we are in fruitcake heaven.

In addition to making the full size cakes I make every year, I decided to try a new recipe and make some smaller cakes to go in our gift hampers. These little beauties are rich and moist and fragrant. And oh yeah, they are also packed with rum!

Individual Rum* Christmas Cakes
Recipe source TBA

840g mixed dried fruit (apricots, cherries, figs, raisins, currants, cranberries, sultanas or whatever takes your fancy)
3/4 cup rum
250g unsalted butter, chopped
1 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup treacle
4 eggs
1 1/2 cups pecans, chopped
1 1/2 cups plain flour
1 1/2 cups self-raising flour
2 ts ground nutmeg
2 ts ground ginger
2 ts ground cinnamon
12 tbs rum, extra

Chop all the dried fruit into small pieces. Place in a large bowl with the rum and mix well. Cover and leave overnight (I left mine for a week), stirring occasionally.

Preheat the oven to slow (150 degrees C). Lightly grease 12 x 1 cup muffin holes and line the bases with a circle of baking paper.

Beat the butter, sugar and treacle in a large bowl until just combined. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Stir in the soaked fruit mixture, pecans and then the sifted flours and spices and mix well.

Spoon the mixture evenly into the tins, smoothing the surface of each with wet fingers. Bake for 1 - 1 1/4 hours, or until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean. Cover the tops of the cakes with foil if over-browning. Once cooked and still hot, brush the tops the cakes with half the extra rum, cover with baking paper, then seal firmly with foil and cool completely in the tins.

Once cool, remove from the tins, brush with remaining rum and wrap firmly with cling film and leave for 2 weeks before decorating.

Decorating Options

1. Soft Icing - Roll out 100g of soft, ready made white icing the the size of each cake. Brush the cakes with warmed apricot jam, then lay the icing over the top and smooth down. Decorate with ribbon.

2. Royal Icing - Beat 1 egg white with a wooden spoon, gradually adding 2 cups of pure icing sugar, beating until smooth. Drizzle in 2-3 ts lemon juice until the icing becomes a little runny. Spread a tablespoon of the icing over each cake, allowing it to run down the sides a little. Top with holly and berries before the icing sets hard.

* The original recipe called for bourbon. We're not big bourbon drinkers in this house so we used good old Bundy Rum instead!

The Kitchen Reader Cookie Exchange - Rum Balls

Ok so I know these aren't technically cookies, but they are cookie-ish! Instead of a book review, this month Jennifer of Cooking for Comfort suggested a Christmas Cookie Exchange for the Kitchen Reader members. So while these aren't cookies they are definitely Christmassey and perfect for sharing.

I'm not sure where Rum Balls originate but there are as many different recipes as there are days in the year (I may be exaggerating slightly!). Basically if there is rum, chocolate and some sort of carb (either cake crumbs, biscuit crumbs or even weetbix) you have yourself a rum ball.

These make the perfect gift at Christmas time and are great to get the kids into as there is no baking involved. Perhaps just leave out the rum!! (cranberry juice would be a great alternative and you would end up with a choc-cranberry truffle).

Susan's Rum Balls

500g cake (a madeira or pound cake is perfect)
1/2 cup cocoa
1 cup dessicated coconut
1/2 dried cranberries
1 tin (approx 400g) condensed milk
2 tbs rum plus extra
1-2 cups dessicated coconut, extra

Roughly chop the cranberries and add to a small saucepan with the 2tbs rum and 1 tbs water. Bring to the boil then simmer until all the liquid is absorbed and the fruit is plump. Remove from the heat and allow to cool.

Tear the cake into rough chunks and add to the food processor with the cocoa. Blitz until the cake is in crumbs and the cocoa is evenly distributed.

Turn out the cake crumbs into a large bowl and add the coconut, cooled cranberries and the condensed milk. Mix thouroughly, adding extra rum if you find you need more liquid (an extra tablespoon or so will be plenty).

Roll into walnut sized balls, roll in the extra dessicated coconut then set on a tray. Refrigerate until required. These are best to make the day before you need them to allow the flavours to meld. Makes approx 30.