Easy Decadent Truffles

I'm going to a girls' night out with some friends, and each of us is supposed to bring something to eat. I've been seriously craving something sweet and chocolaty and decadent! So I made chocolate truffles. You know, even though I'm trying to lose weight and eat healthy and save money on food - I just have to splurge sometimes! Besides, we already had all the ingredients handy so I don't consider this to be much of a monetary splurge. Weight-wise, however...

Using this recipe, I made three flavors of truffles: plain chocolate, lemon, and mint. Each one was delicious!


Easy Decadent Truffles
1 8-oz. package cream cheese, softened (I did use low-fat, so it wasn't quite as bad as it could have been...)
3 cups powdered sugar, sifted
3 cups semisweet chocolate chips, melted
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla (or other flavorings)

In a large bowl, beat cream cheese until smooth. Gradually beat in confectioners' sugar until well blended. Stir in melted chocolate and vanilla until no streaks remain. Refrigerate for about 1 hour. Shape into 1 inch balls. Roll truffles in ground walnuts (or any ground nuts), cocoa, coconut, confectioners' sugar, candy sprinkles, etc. You could also choose to dip them in melted chocolate.


I separated the truffle into three batches after stirring in the chocolate. I put 1/2 tsp. vanilla in one batch, 1/2 tsp. lemon extract in the second, and 1/2 tsp. mint extract in the third. Then I chilled them separately. After shaping into balls, I rolled the vanilla-flavored chocolate in cocoa, I rolled the lemon-flavored chocolate in powdered sugar, and I rolled the mint-flavored chocolate in green sugar. I wanted to try almond extract rolled in ground walnuts. But I would have had to grind the walnuts myself and didn't feel like doing all that work. Of course, if I wanted to avoid work, perhaps I could have chosen a recipe that didn't include rolling out balls of chocolate by hand and rolling them in cocoa and sugar... Well, you pick your battles, I guess. :-)

Just so you know, this was rather messy work...


...but a lot of fun!