Raspberry, Chocolate, and Macadamia Truffles

Are you searching for the ultimate keto Valentine’s Day recipe? Or just something luscious to treat yourself and your loved ones? These Raspberry, Chocolate, and Macadamia Truffles might be among the most delicious (keto) recipes you’ve ever tried. Who would be able to resist the superb combination of fruity raspberries, rich dark chocolate, and crunchy macadamias? Not me — and not my family, either. I bet you and your family, too, will also enjoy these treats to the last bite! So, why not try this whole family-approved recipe already today? How to make the Raspberry, Chocolate, and Macadamia Truffles This is an easy recipe, though the ingredients need some chopping and crushing. The chocolate can be very roughly chopped, but the macadamias taste better if they are finely chopped – and the freeze-dried raspberries should be very finely crushed, resembling fine powder. For all that crushing and chopping, a food processor comes in handy here. First, you can chop the macadamias with the food processor — and crushing the freeze-dried raspberries is much quicker and easier with a food processor than with hands (like I used to prefer to do). Actually, this small amount of freeze-dried raspberries is easy to crush with an immersion blender, too. However, if you don’t have a food processor, a good old knife works well, so choppity chop – it’s worth it! In case you don’t have some of the ingredients, please check the substitutions in the How to vary the Raspberry, Chocolate, and Macadamia Truffle recipe section at the (almost) end of this post. But let’s take a look at how to prepare these tastier than ever keto truffles: Pour 1/2 cup (120 ml) heavy cream into a small saucepan. Heat over high heat until piping hot. Don’t let boil! Remove from the heat. Add 8 oz (230 g) roughly chopped very dark chocolate. I prefer to use 85 % chocolate. Shake the saucepan very carefully to distribute the chocolate and cream evenly. Close with a lid and let stand 10 minutes. Then, add 1/2 cup (120 ml) – or more — finely chopped macadamia nuts… …and 1/4 cup (60 ml) sugar-free raspberry jam (I prefer homemade). Stir with a spoon… …until smooth. Cover, and refrigerate for 1 hour, or until firm enough to shape. Here in Finland, we still have a fridge temperature outside, so I brought the saucepan to the stairs. Anyway, my two fridges are filled with all kinds of experiments, so there is really no space there – and the outdoors is basically an infinite fridge! (There are some benefits of living in a cold country!) Now the mixture looks firm enough to handle. You need about 1/4 cup (60 ml) finely-crushed freeze-dried raspberries for rolling. I’ve used an immersion blender to get this fine consistency. Shape the chocolate mixture into 24 walnut-sized (or 1-inch = 2.5 cm) balls. Roll each ball in the crushed freeze-dried raspberries. Gorgeous, isn’t it! Hmm, it might have been a good idea to wear gloves. This is pretty messy business, as you can see! Place the ready truffles onto parchment paper-covered plate or chopping board. Refrigerate until firm, about 2 hours. Enjoy — preferably with your loved ones! You can also make a gorgeous gift with these treats packing them into a beautiful box or bag. (Just remember to store the truffles in the fridge!) How I came up with the Raspberry, Chocolate, and Macadamia Truffle recipe The idea for this recipe is actually originating from the thought to make something delicious for my husband for Valentine’s Day. My hubby adores the combo of chocolate and strawberry, and I was pondering over dessert ideas, how I could use this awesome combination. Usually, when I ask him what special treat he would like for the Valentine’s, he replies “chocolate and strawberry cake”. Well, I’ve made so many chocolate and strawberry cakes over these years — also for his birthdays — that this time, I decided not to ask from him but prepare something different instead. After some ideation, I decided to make truffles with chocolate and strawberry. For the base, I wanted to use ganache made with very dark chocolate (85 % cocoa) and heavy cream – just the right ratios to a melt-in-your-mouth consistency. But how to incorporate strawberries into the mixture? I decided to add a little bit of homemade strawberry jam to give some flavor and a hint of sweetness as well. When using jam that already had sweetener, there was no need to add any sweeteners to the truffle mixture. But I doubted pure strawberry jam was enough to provide a decent amount of strawberry flavor. I often use freeze-dried strawberries — Finnish ones, as the foreign ones are inferior and not as tasty as those ruby red jewels that grow in the bright and light Finnish summer. Moreover, imported freeze-dried strawberries come mostly from China. And you never know how and where they are grown and what additional stuff — like pesticides — they contain. So, I was first planning to add some crushed freeze-dried strawberries to the truffle mixture but then got a better idea: if I rolled the truffles in finely-crushed freeze-dried strawberries, they would look absolutely adorable — and perfect for Valentine’s Day with all that gorgeous red color. Sounded good to me! On the other hand, I still wanted to conduct some more experiments. As all kinds of nuts are perfect for truffles, I thought rolling the truffles in a mixture of finely chopped nuts would give some crunch — or maybe rolling the truffles in a combo of crushed freeze-dried strawberries and chopped nuts would bring the most delicious result. I chose macadamia nuts to my experiments as they are the best keto nut out there. They contain the most fat — and the fat is mainly monounsaturated. First, I prepared the basic truffle mixture with chopped dark chocolate and cream. Based on my previous truffle experiments, I did some careful calculations on how much chocolate and cream I would need for this recipe. I made a smaller batch first, using 4 oz (115 g) chocolate and 1/4 cup (60 ml) heavy cream. I heated the heavy cream in a small saucepan until piping hot and then added the chopped chocolate. After 10 minutes, I stirred the mixture until smooth. At least it looked good! Next, I took 1 tablespoon homemade strawberry jam and 2 tablespoons finely chopped macadamias. The amount of macadamias looked far too little, so I doubled the amount. Now it both looked good and tasted as well. Actually, maybe there could have been even more macadamias. I shaped the mixture into balls. Some of the balls I rolled in chopped macadamias, some of the balls in finely-crushed freeze-dried strawberries and some of them in finely-crushed freeze-dried raspberries. And some I rolled in both nuts and berries. Like this: I thought I’ll let my husband taste which of the versions he prefers most, but I realized I had to get the recipe photos and videos done so I couldn’t wait until he comes home. I simply had to rely on my gut feeling and guess which one of my experiments would be his favorite. Intuitively, I chose the version with freeze-dried raspberries for the final recipe – not with strawberries, as I had initially planned. I shot the photos and the video, and finally, when my husband came home, I let him taste my experiments — not letting him know that I had already made my decision for the final recipe with raspberries, not with strawberries. To my (not so big) surprise, he indeed preferred the raspberry-covered truffles after tasting my experiments – the exact version I had finally used in the photos and in the video. Well, sometimes (or actually quite often), I think I know my husband’s taste better than he himself! Well, we’ve been close to 20 years together, 18 years to be exact, so there has been enough time to learn the preferences of each other. But the best thing is, that still after 18 years, it’s great to notice that he is my Mr. Right — who is always by my side and never lets me down. Also, my son was thrilled about the truffles and gobbled down my last experiments. He, too, was raving about the taste of the raspberry version. My husband and my son were fighting over the last truffle. Finally, they halved the truffle and enjoyed the pieces in peace. Here’s the recipe for you to enjoy. I bet you can’t wait to make these treats! Print Raspberry, Chocolate, and Macadamia Truffles Author: Elviira 8 oz = 230 g 85 % chocolate, roughly chopped 1/2 cup = 120 ml heavy cream 1/2 cup = 120 ml finely chopped macadamia nuts 1/4 cup = 60 ml homemade or good-quality commercial sugar-free raspberry jam 1/4 cup = 60 ml finely crushed (organic) freeze-dried raspberries Heat the cream in a small saucepan until piping hot. Don't let boil! Remove from the heat. Add the chopped chocolate. Cover, and let stand 10 minutes. Add the macadamia nuts and the jam. Mix until smooth. Place in the fridge until firm enough to handle, about 1 hour. Shape the chocolate mixture into 1-inch (2.5 cm) balls. Roll the balls in finely crushed freeze-dried raspberries. Refrigerate the truffles in the fridge until firm, about 2 hours or overnight. Store in the fridge for up to 1 week. 4.5.2.16 https://www.lowcarbsosimple.com/raspberry-chocolate-and-macadamia-truffles/ Images, text and recipe fully copyrighted by Low-Carb, So Simple Nutrition information In total Per truffle if 24 truffles in total Protein 37.5 g 1.6 g Fat 192.6 g 8.0 g Net carbs 60.7 g 2.5 g kcal 2245 kcal 94 kcal   How to vary the Raspberry, Chocolate, and Macadamia Truffle recipe Feel free to replace the raspberries with strawberries. You can use sugar-free strawberry jam in the truffle mixture and finely-crushed freeze-dried strawberries for rolling. The good thing is that strawberries don’t have that big seeds like raspberries. As you can see, the raspberry seeds are not that easy to crush. From freeze-dried strawberries, you’ll easily make a really fine powder. Actually, you can use any other homemade sugar-free jam — or commercial sugar-free jam if you happen to find a decent product meaning it doesn’t contain artificial sweeteners, preservatives, food additives, or anything nasty. You can naturally omit the jam altogether and use 1/4 cup (60 ml) freeze-dried raspberries, strawberries or other freeze-dried berries if you want to avoid all sweeteners. Instead of macadamia nuts, try other low-carb nuts like pecans, almonds, walnuts, or shredded unsweetened coconut. Also, mild-flavored seeds like sunflower seeds or hemp hearts are worth trying. I use raw macadamias, but roasted nuts or seeds lend more nutty flavor, so feel free to roast them, or buy ready-roasted nuts or seeds. And if you really like crunch in your truffles and adore nutty flavor, you can use a whole cup (240 ml) of finely-chopped nuts or seeds. For adults-only version, add a tablespoon or two rum, cognac, tequila, or any other carb-free alcohol you like. To further reduce the carb count, you can use even darker chocolate, like 90 % chocolate – in which case one truffle contains 2.1 grams net carbs. For more sweetness, you can add a few drops vanilla stevia. Talking about vanilla, 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract lends a scrumptious vanilla note to these truffles – so it’s highly recommended. General prattling Earlier this week, we received the second batch of our creamy keto berry mousse Ketokamu product experiment — except this version was berry butter because the company that had manufactured the test batch to us had beat the mixture too much, so it turned into butter. Well, but the purpose was to test the flavor, not the consistency, so we were not too disappointed. Here’s the delicious strawberry butter: Funnily enough, this time, the product was packed into kokkelipiimä containers. Kokkelipiimä is a kind of chunky buttermilk, a specialty of Eastern Finland. We actually have been joking a lot about kokkelipiimä, so it was sort of hilarious to get the berry mousse (or in this case: berry butter) in kokkelipiimä containers (photo by Olli Posti): This week, we were supposed to go to Vaajakoski, a small town in Central Finland, to make some product development related to nuts and chocolate. However, we had to postpone this trip to February (I will certainly report about that trip!). Anyway, this didn’t prevent me from making some delicious chocolate and nut experiments at home: Next week will be really fascinating. On Monday, we are going to make soup experiments in Kuopio, Eastern Finland. On Tuesday, I will have an exciting day (sorry, it’s all confidential, but I hope I can share some information soon!). And on Wednesday we will have a meeting with a small local sausage factory about the possible future cooperation. On Sunday, Feb 9th, I will be speaking at the Minä Olen fair in Finlandia House in Helsinki. They are also going to do live streaming for those who cannot attend (you can get tickets here – sorry, only in Finnish). My presentation will also be in Finnish (though in the future, I might translate the presentation in English). After the presentation I will be signing my books and answering questions. My newest book about a keto-vegan diet is going to be launched next week, so hopefully, I will be able to sign those books as well. Super-exciting! Related posts: Sugar-Free Hot Fudge Sauce Low-Carb Raspberry Chocolate Chip Parfait The Ultimate Dairy-Free Sugar-Free White Chocolate Keto White Hot Chocolate