Truffles Coated in Freeze Dried Raspberry Powder

White chocolate, pistachio, raspberry and cardamom is one of my favourite flavour combinations. I often use it in cakes and tarts, so why not truffles? Raspberry powder is tart, refreshing and cuts nicely through the sweetness of chocolate.

This Instructable uses freeze dried raspberries. Freeze dried fruits are wonderful for desserts, they provide concentrated flavour and colour and can be used in recipes where moisture is not wanted, like chocolates, macaroons, buttercream etc. You could get them from a supermarket or online, but in some countries they either overcharge like crazy or only sell in bulk. Here's how to get freeze dried berries without breaking the bank.

Makes 18 truffles:

3tbs double cream
150g good quality white chocolate, chopped
1/4 tsp cardamom powder
1/3 cup (50g) roasted, chopped pistachios or whole pistachios
1tsp icing sugar (powdered sugar)
15g freeze dried raspberries

You will find freeze dried fruit mixed in with healthy-ish cereal. Make sure to check ingredient lists. Some cereal boxes have pictures with fruit, but ingredient lists reveal they have no fruit in those. Also, make sure it specifically says 'freeze dried fruits', not 'dehydrated' or 'dried'.

For this recipe you will need approximately 15g of raspberries. I used two boxes of cereal with 5% fruit content, each box was 375g, so I was expecting a little less than 36g freeze dried fruit (some bits were too small to fish out). I used cereal with mixed strawberries and raspberries, separated them and ended up with around 15g each.

I reserved strawberries for other recipes (I recommend buttercream frosting with powdered strawberries).

I put raspberries and 1tsp icing sugar in a coffee/spice grinder or blender and blended until powdered. Passed that through a fine sieve and set aside.

If using whole, unroasted nuts, roast them for 6min at 350°F/180°C. Cool them down. Grind 3TBS of pistachios into fine powder and chop 2-3 TBS into small pieces.

Use a stove or a microwave.
In a small pot (or a bowl) combine cream, cardamom and 3TBS pistachio powder. Heat it up, but don't let it boil. Such small quantity of cream won't take long to warm, so watch closely.

Add chopped chocolate to heated cream, let it sit for a minute and mix until smooth. Stir in 2-3TBS chopped nuts, transfer chocolate to a bowl and cover with cling film. Let it cool down before putting in the fridge for 2-3 hours.

After 2-3h in the fridge, ganache should be set enough to scoop with a spoon (cool it longer if mixture is too soft). Do just that, scoop equal amounts of chocolate, roll them in your hands and spread the balls all over a plate or a cookie sheet, cover with cling film and put back in a fridge to firm up for 2-4 hours (depends on your fridge and the type of chocolate used).

Take the truffles out of the fridge and let them sit in room temperature for 30 min. By allowing them to soften a little bit on the outside you will ensure they are easy to roll and pick up good amount of powder.

Once again, sift raspberry powder through a fine sieve and, one by one, roll truffles in the powder.