I’ve been playing around lately with a lot of raw “cooking”. I haven’t made real food, I’ve been sticking to desserts. Over Passover I made chocolate mousse from avocados, and for Shavuot I made a chocolate cheese cake. I’ve been having a lot of fun with it.
What’s raw? It’s exactly what it sounds like. You don’t cook anything. You use the food as is. The only thing that comes close to cooking is dehydrating food. That’s just taking out the water from it, so that’s considered OK.
This time around, I decided to play with chocolate truffles. My cousin Toby (of whole wheat challah fame) and her husband have stopped eating sugar (some people have the craziest diet restrictions :-)). When I say stopped I mean they have no sugar at all. They check the labels of the food that they bring into the house. Everything they cook and bake is without any refined sugar.
That said – they don’t go completely sweet free. They sometimes eat foods made with other sweeteners. Besides agave, stevia, date honey and maple syrup, dates by themselves work wonderfully in recipes. I’ve used them for raw pie bottoms, and when I make almond milk, they gave a nice sweetness and thickness to the milk. The juicier dates are the Medjool dates. They’re the ones to use.
When Toby and her family came to us for Passover, she made chocolate truffles out of dates. That’s what inspired this recipe.
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
Raw Chocolate Truffles
These don't have a heavy date taste. The dates are there to give texture and sweetness.
Ingredients
- dates - 1/2 cup
- almonds - 1 cup
- vanilla - 1 teaspoon
- agave syrup - 1 teaspoon
- water - 3 tablespoons
- cocoa powder - 2 tablespoons
- salt - pinch
- coconut flakes - about 1/3 cup - to roll the balls in
Instructions
- Grind almonds in a food processor until well ground
- Add dates and grind some more
- Add the rest of the ingredients and process until you have a thick paste
- Roll into balls about 1 1/2 centimeters in diameter
- Roll in coconut flakes
Allergens
I’ve seen a lot of recipes that use walnuts. For me, walnuts are a very heavy nut and sometimes have a bit of a bitter taste to them. I like using walnuts with mushrooms as a meat substitute, but in this recipe I prefer to use almonds.
Warning: Your hands will be very sticky while your roll the truffles. I thought about putting on rubber gloves before I started, but I don’t think that would have helped much. You can try wetting your hands a bit between truffles, but don’t use too much water or the truffles will get mushy and it will be harder to roll them in the coconut flakes.
These guys are fun to make. I hope you enjoy them!
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Wow, I feel like such a celebrity! I’m glad that you liked the recipe – we’ve also used almonds sometimes instead of walnuts, and you’re right, it’s delicious. This really is a recipe that can be played with to no end – try different nuts, different sweeteners, no sweeteners, different flavorings (I’ve been considering making something similar with cinnamon) different things to roll them in…
Enjoy!
Thank you! These are quickly becoming a family favorite. I love how easy and fun to make they are. What’s your favorite topping?
Wow! Thank you! At WWNBSAH many of our Adminour vegan, vegetarian AND jewish (not all but many) we are delighted with the recipes we have found, first saw the vegan kneidlach (which we will be sharing to our page ( https://www.facebook.com/WeWillNotBeSilencedAboutHunters) and twitter ( @WWNBSAH ) and now this, the truffles which ( we will also share ) look yum yum yum YUM . Thank you BOTH of you Toby & Rena, from the team at WWNBSAH. 🙂