Divine Vegan Chocolate Truffles for Valentine’s Day

Mouthwatering vegan chocolate truffles add a personal touch to your Valentine’s Day gift.

Divine Vegan Chocolate Truffles for Valentine's Day

Valentine’s Day has the unfortunate reputation of a Hallmark holiday, co-opted by corporate culture with glitter tags, sugar overdose, and stressful, overbooked restaurant outings.

Infuse your Valentine’s gifts with a little personal touch this year by cooking your own special meal for your love or making your own gifts, like these deliciously divine vegan chocolate truffles.

Divine Vegan Chocolate Truffles

adapted from Food.com

Ingredients

3/4 cup raw cashews
3/4 cup cold water
1 lb bittersweet chocolate
cocoa powder

Cooking Directions

Put cashews and cold water in a blender and blend at high speed for 1-2 minutes.
Scrape the sides down and blend again until the mixture is the consistency of heavy cream.
Heat the chocolate in a double boiler until it’s all melted. If you don’t have a double boiler, place the chocolate in a bowl inside a pot of boiling water.
Cool the chocolate until it’s comfortable to work with and fold in the cashew cream. Make sure not to stir too fast or you’ll create bubbles.
Cool in the fridge for 2 hours. Alternatively, you can also freeze them for half and hour and then transfer the fridge for a faster cooldown time.
After they’ve thoroughly cooled and hardened, take out a small ball, and shape it with your hands. You can also use a melon baller. Roll the truffle ball in cocoa powder and store in the fridge or freezer.
Repeat until finished.

For more variety, you can try adding peanut butter filling, crushed nuts, puffed rice, or liqueur. You can also roll the truffles in shredded coconut, crushed nuts, powdered sugar, cinnamon, or other spices.

For a Valentine’s Day twist, you can add a berry jam inside such as strawberry or raspberry jam, and decorate your truffles with half a raspberry on top. For the adventurous ones, you can also try to shape your truffles into a heart shape.

Use fair trade organic chocolate when possible!

[CC Image by frangrit via Flickr]