Chocolate Ganache

[randyjl]

I am going to try my first ganache. The recipe make more than I need. Is ganache always equal amounts chocolate and heavy cream? And can flavors be added like almond oil, peppermint oil. vanilla, etc? What does not work with ganache?

[pine time]

I nearly always flavor ganache with a liqeuer, often Amaretto or Kahlua.

[Hank Hanover]

If you are going to hand roll truffles, I use 1 pound of chocolate and 1 cup cream. If I am going to do molded truffles, I use 2 cups cream to 1 pound of chocolate. For say a ganache frosting, I would use something in between.

For flavoring, you can use extracts, liqueurs or you can use Loran Flavor oils

http://www.amazon.com/LorAnn-Flavorin...

Loran flavor oils indicate some that aren't appropriate with chocolate. Consult their web site. Caution these flavor oils are 3 to 4 times stronger than extracts.

[randyjl]

Actually I am planning to use the ganache to glaze a cake. Thanks for the replies!

[chowser]

This might be heresy but if I'm using ganache to glaze a cake, I add a little corn syrup for shine.

[biondanonima]

Yes, I would use a bit of butter for shine if I were using it as a glaze. Also, get the cake cold before pouring on the ganache - that helps it set faster and increases the shine factor.

[Hank Hanover]

Yep... I would use butter in a glaze... in fact I put butter in almost all my ganaches for richness and shine.

[Emme]

i do the same... just used this last weekend with a yellow cake with chocolate swiss meringue butter cream filling...
bring 240 ml (1 cup) heavy cream with 2 tbsp corn syrup and 25 g of sugar over medium low heat, to a boil, making sure sugar is dissolved. pour over 453 g semisweet chocolate, stir til melted and smooth. stir in 57 g of butter. sometimes i add a tsp or two of vanilla as well.

[biondanonima]

Hank, when you say molded truffles, do you mean you pour the ganache into molds, let it set, pop them out and then coat with chocolate? Or do you coat your molds with couverture chocolate first? I would think that a 1:1 ratio of cream to chocolate would be way too soft to pop out of a mold...

[Hank Hanover]

You have to coat the molds with chocolate and let it dry then pipe your ganache in. Then you coat all the tops with chocolate and refrigerate. Usually you end up coating the top of all the truffles and then scraping the excess chocolate off.

For molded truffles, you are using a thin ganache and it has been whipped so it is sorta like frosting on the inside.

[bondi2026]

That's fine as long as the chocolate used to coat the molds has first be tempered. Using molds is tricky. I simply make truffles from the ganache and then dip them in tempered chocolate. They can then be rolled in toasted nuts, cocoa powder or whatever you prefer.

[Hank Hanover]

I, too, prefer the hand rolled. In fact, my friends that I make truffles for seem to prefer the hand rolled. They like to know that they are hand made. They aren't perfect circles. They have a small puddle.

If they want the molded ones, they can go down to Godiva for that.

As far as the tempering, I have a tempering machine... what can I say, I'm lazy. Yes, the dipping chocolate has to be tempered with either molded or hand rolled truffles.

[biondanonima]

A tempering machine is definitely on my list of things I would like to own if I ever get a larger kitchen and more time to play with chocolate! I don't think it has anything to do with laziness - tempering by hand is tricky, and if you do a lot of chocolate work a tempering machine is simply a time and frustration-saving tool.

[biondanonima]

Oh, I see - I was wondering how you could use such a thin ganache for molded truffles but if you whip it that makes perfect sense!

[biondanonima]

You can vary the proportion of cream to chocolate depending on the consistency you want. For rolling into truffles, I like to use about 20% more chocolate than cream. If I want to use it as a pourable glaze, maybe 10% more cream than chocolate. You can definitely add flavors (sparingly), as well as a little corn syrup and/or butter if you want more sweetness or gloss.

[Crockett67]

+1.

For some bourbon truffles. Use the above suggestion and add ~1T bourbon to a 12oz bag of semisweet to ~9oz heavy cream. Melt over double boiler or very slowly in microwave.

Let cool in a container. When solid, ball with melon baller and roll in sliced toasted almonds or pecan pieces. May have to press them in a little bit. Then squirel away a few for yourself because they always go fast!!