Bacon Butter

I have gone through a few recipes (of my own) for bacon truffles and I am still unsatisfied. I just can't seem to get something right. Yes, they taste great, but to me something is still off. I can't decide if I like whole bacon pieces in the truffles or not. So in an attempt to eliminate the bacon pieces, but keep the bacon flavor I decided to try making bacon powder.

I cooked the bacon as well as I could without it burning. It is quite an art that has taken me some time to learn. I must admit though, I am the best now when it comes to cooking crisp (not burnt) bacon. Then I crunched the bacon into little pieces and put it into a coffee grinder. This worked at first, but because of the grease in the bacon it started to stick together and wouldn't grind anymore. So I added some corn starch as a sort of binding agent that would also dry out the bacon. This worked at first, but after a while the bacon grease overpowered the corn starch, thus making it wet and sticky again.

After a few different attempts at bacon powder, I finally realized that it was not going to work. What I had created though, was a lovely bacon butter. It resembles a chunky looking peanut butter, but when tasted, it obviously was bacon. This bacon butter was a whole new revelation to me! It could be spread on sandwiches, used in dips, or the original reason for making it, I could use it in my bacon truffle.

So I did! It worked great, but you still get the little tiny pieces of bacon. I think I prefer that to having whole chunks of bacon in the truffle though. So I present to you my bacon truffle made from my own creation: bacon butter.

Blueberry Mojito!

I have a new flavor! Once again, my Dad came into play on this one. (Parents are so helpful!) Lately my dad has been very into creating his own ice-creams and sorbets. I must admit, he has become quite good at it too. Our family has a definite sweet tooth. One of his latest creations was a blueberry mojito sorbet...or maybe it was an ice-cream. Either way, it seemed like a genius flavor combination. He told me about it and mentioned how good it could be in a dark chocolate. So I set to work!


Sure enough blueberry with mojito combined in a dark chocolate ganache was a match made in heaven. I might just go mix up the frozen drinkable version of it now! Mojito has the flavors mint, lime, and of course dark rum. These were all very evident and flavorful in the truffle that I created. The blueberry flavor though, was more hidden. It came through just slightly, but I think it was overpowered by the other flavors. This truffle will be perfect when I can get the blueberry to shine through a little more.

Zest Chocolat LLC!

Today I applied for my LLC license, how exciting!! I am 3/4's of the way finished to making Zest an official business. And I have a feeling this is the easy part...

Next week Andy and I will be moving back to Harrisonburg, VA (our hometown!) where I will finish making Zest a business. I am hoping to get our kitchen there inspected and then I will officially be in business! There is still so much to do, (oh the details!) but at least I am getting there.

My dad has been so amazing in helping me design the logo for Zest. I had a few ideas and he had a few ideas, and in the end he has come up with a spectacular design! Here is a first look at what he has come up with and will continue to work on. I am more than trilled!

Salted Caramels

I have been craving salted caramels for a while now. Finally late the other night I got around to making them. Caramels take a while to make, so I was in the kitchen a little longer than anticipated. Once they were made I stuck them in the refrigerator for some quick cooling. When I took them out and tried to remove them from the parchment paper I realized they were stuck. Oh no! When I had put the parchment paper into the pan I must have put the wrong side down. It took me a while to to peel them off of the paper. Then, because I had messed up their shape I decided the best thing to do would be to re-melt them, but in a silicone mold rather than in a parchment lined pan. This time they came out perfect. The next day I dipped them in dark chocolate and topped them with a little fleur de sel. They are delicious!

New Flavors

A few weeks ago I made some truffles for a Guerilla Gallery art opening in Harrisonburg. It was put on by a good friend of mine. I did them as "art" along with some photographs of chocolate. The whole gallery was a huge success and my truffles went fast. I should have charged for them, but since it was a free art opening I wanted to be able to provide free truffles as well.

I made a total of 5 kinds of truffles, of which 3 were new flavors. Below are pictures of the new flavors. I was mostly pleased with them, but of course tweaking will be done before I make them again.

(Cinnamon Orange in a mild dark chocolate)

(Ginger Lemongrass in white chocolate)

(Red-wine Rosemary in milk chocolate)

Guerrilla Gallery

Flavors:
Chai Tea, Ginger Lemon-Grass, Espresso, Cinnamon Orange, Red-Wine Rosemary

What a wonderful weekend! Andy and I went back to our hometown this weekend and had such a great time. A good friend of mine created an art show in a vacant building downtown. It was called Guerrilla Gallery and it was up for one night of viewing only. She asked me if I would make some chocolate truffles for the event, so I agreed and then Andy and I decided to make a weekend of it. The truffles turned out great an the art show was fantastic...such talented artists! My friend who put the whole event together actually sold most of her artwork. She rocks! The truffles were also a hit, they were gone with the blink of an eye! Next time I need to put out a questionnaire so I can get some feedback. Overall it was a great time to make connections, get a feel for how my future truffle business will go, see some awesome art, and spend quality time with friends and family.

Scotch Bacon Truffles

These are the truffles that that Andy and I made a little film about. I had originally wanted to make Bacon and Bourbon truffles, but we didn't have bourbon, so scotch would suffice. The scotch was gifted to Andy by a coworker and was some pretty good stuff. He was reluctant to let me use some, but finally gave into the cause.

In the end these turned out well, but somewhere in the ganache process my chocolate did not want to mix. I'll have to look into the science of it, but I am thinking the scotch was the culprit. Chocolate and water do NOT mix and because liquor has water in it that may have been it. This is exactly why I like to experiment though. Sometimes I make great breakthroughs, and other times I fail miserably. These truffles were not a complete fail, as they did finally work out, but I don't know how much I'll be working with scotch in chocolate again.

The final truffle came out quite nice. I think I put too many bacon pieces into the ganache, but that can easily be fixed. Otherwise, it had a great bacon flavor with a nice aftertaste of scotch. The scotch aftertaste was very faint, but it was there and it created a nice finish to the flavors. This is my second try at a bacon truffle and I like it. I think it works!