Rum Balls

As we approach the holiday season I wanted to make some easy but tasty treats.  One of my ideas was rum balls and I checked on the internet and saw that Joyofbaking had a very simple recipe that looked good.  So I decided to make mine using that recipe as the basis.  

There is no baking required, it is simply a case of mixing various ingredients together and then forming into balls, coating with any variety of coverings available.

For mine I used some sweetened coconut flour to coat some balls, and then icing sugar, cocoa powder and ground hazelnuts for others.  I also opted for some melted chocolate for about half of the balls to give an even more decadent treat.

These balls are very easy to make and delicious to eat.  They can be served at any time and will be enjoyed by most adults.  The recipe can also be varied, with different flavours of alcohol or even using fruit juices if you want something that doesn’t have alcohol in.  I have already to do a cherry and kirsch variant in the next few days, so that will appear on this blog very soon too.

Ingredients:
for the rum balls:

• 150g finely ground hazelnuts(or any nut that you like, walnuts, pecans etc)
• 125g finely ground biscuits, such as digestive, graham crackers, shortbread
• 60g icing sugar
• 15g cocoa powder
• 60ml dark rum
• 2 tbsp golden syrup(or corn syrup)

For the coating, any mixture you like will be fine. Depending on how many balls you wish to coat with each flavour you will need differing amounts, but small amounts only are necessary. I used:

• sweetened coconut flour(dessicated coconut would be good too).  
• cocoa powder
• icing sugar
• finely ground hazelnuts
• melted dark chocolate(with some white chocolate or milk chocolate piped over later)

Method:

1. In a large bowl place the hazelnuts, biscuits crumbs, icing sugar and cocoa powder.
2. Mix until they are all evenly combined.
3. Add the golden syrup and dark rum and stir until the mixture comes together into a clump.
4. Cover with plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for an hour.
5. Remove the mixture from the fridge and form into 40 one inch balls.
6. Roll each ball in one of the coating mixtures and set aside.  If using melted chocolate chill the balls in the fridge for about 15 minutes before dipping in the chocolate, draining the excess and placing on parchment paper for the chocolate to set hard.
7. If desired pipe a little melted white chocolate or milk chocolate over the chocolate balls, in a zig-zag pattern and allow to set.