These booze balls are made with melted dark chocolate, crushed cookies, ground nuts, and Amaretto liqueur for a boozy chocolate truffle that is as easy to make as it is to eat!
Booze balls are easy to make and are a great edible homemade gift that you can send to loved ones. They don't require refrigeration and can be stored at room temperature for a month.
In fact, storing them allows the booze flavours to develop over time, infusing the cookie crumbs in the mixture. So it's actually better to make these ahead and store them for a couple of weeks before serving them!
Booze balls or amaretto balls are easier to make than truffles. Truffles are made from chocolate ganache (like these Earl grey lavender chocolate truffles made from a 1:1 ratio of dark chocolate to cream, by weight). Truffles require refrigeration to store them because they are made with cream. They also require careful mixing of the ingredients because the ganache is an emulsion that is delicate and can break.
I'd say booze balls are more akin to cake truffles, which are made by combining crumbs of leftover cake with milk or alcohol. You can make Christmas cake balls from leftover White fruitcake and booze, and you can make birthday cake truffles with leftover confetti cake.
With booze balls, I like to use a sweet liqueur like amaretto, which is an almond flavoured liqueur, but I bet these would taste great with a spiced rum, which is less sweet, or even bourbon. You could also consider a liqueur like coffee-flavoured Kahlúa or orange-flavoured Cointreau.
I like to roll amaretto balls in granulated sugar, but you could also roll them in shredded coconut, especially if you make them with spiced rum. You can also coat them in sprinkles if you prefer, which will give them a crunchy texture.
📖 Recipe
Booze Balls
Equipment
Ingredients
- 175 grams Cacao Barry Ocoa 70% dark chocolate or your favourite dark chocolate
- 45 mL corn syrup
- 300 grams vanilla wafers or other grocery store plain cookies like social tea cookies
- 120 grams ground almonds or chopped walnuts
- 63 grams icing sugar
- 125 mL amaretto liqueur
- Granulated sugar for rolling
Instructions
- Melt the chocolate over a double boiler or in the microwave at 50% power. Set aside.
- Add the corn syrup and stir well to mix.
- In the bowl of a food processor, combine the vanilla wafers with the chopped nuts. Process the mixture to form fairly fine crumbs.
- In a large bowl, combine the crumb mixture with the powdered sugar.
- Add the melted chocolate mixture and the amaretto.
- Mix really well with a wooden spoon.
- Let stand about 20 minutes and then form the mixture into 1-inch balls (roughly 13 grams mixture per ball).
- Roll the balls in granulated sugar. Store in an airtight container.
Kevin B says
Made these today and they are the perfect holiday bite, great to bring over when visiting. Discovered that my amaretto was only 14% (it was an "amaretto cocktail drink"... received as a gift), so subbed in some golden rum. They are fantastic.