Pumpkin Spice Latte Truffles

Teaching myself how to cook means I’ve messed up a lot of recipes.

The worst was a lemon pasta dish I tried to make a few years ago. I still don’t know what went wrong – but neither Nick or I would eat it. We hate wasting food, but there was no way we were going to take more than one bite. It went into the trash, along with recipe, and I’ve never gone near a lemon pasta since.

Sometimes, recipe mess-ups are a bad thing.

But every now and then, an accident happens that turns out to be the best thing ever.

You’d never know it from these pictures, but I was trying to make bark on Monday while I was over cooking with Mrs. Doughmesstic herself. We decided to have a cooking day and bounce ideas off each other. Everything was going great until I realized that my bark would not set!

I knew what the culprit was: the pumpkin. I added too much.

You know how you try to add just a little bit of pumpkin to recipes and it totally changes the texture? That’s exactly what happened with these. The pumpkin kept the white chocolate from completely setting, but after Susan and I tasted it,  we knew it could be – and needed to be – changed into something else.

And if you can’t have pumpkin spice latte bark, isn’t the next best thing a pumpkin spice latte truffle?

We took the pumpkin + white chocolate + spice mixture and rolled it into 1-inch truffles, then dipped them and drizzled them with dark chocolate. Also – don’t look too close to those drizzles. Susan made me practice by doing two rows myself and they were definitely wavier than hers. I can make desserts – I just can’t decorate them!

I was super happy with the truffles, but I knew I would be. I love coffee and pumpkin.

The real test was whether Nick would like these. He’s a big fan of coffee, but not so much with the pumpkin.

Thankfully, he gave them two-thumbs up. If I can get Nick to eat something with pumpkin in them, that means I did a pretty good job.

And these are definitely like real truffles – they are rich. Sweet. But the deep dark chocolate, warm spices, and roasty flavor of the espresso will keep you coming back for more.

Want to see what Susan made during our pumpkin extravaganza? Check out her recipe here. And believe me – it’s a good one. I tried it and loved it!

Pumpkin Spice Latte Truffles

Makes: 40 truffles

Ingredients:

  • 10 oz. white chocolate chips
  • 1/4 cup pumpkin puree
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1/2 tsp instant espresso
  • 1/8 tsp nutmeg
  • 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips

Directions:

  1. Melt the white chocolate chips in the microwave (stirring after each 30 second increment) or in a double boiler until the chocolate is smooth.
  2. Stir the pumpkin, cinnamon, vanilla, instant espresso, and nutmeg into the white chocolate.
  3. Spread the mixture onto a parchment or silpat lined baking sheet and place in the refrigerator to cool.
  4. Once the mixture has cooled, remove from the fridge.
  5. Taking 1 rounded teaspoon at a time, roll the truffle mixture into a round and place on the  baking sheet. Once all of your truffles are made, place them back in the refrigerator for 5 mintues.
  6. Melt the dark chocolate chips in the microwave, cooking for 1 – 2 minutes, stirring after every 30 seconds until the chocolate is completely smooth.
  7. Take the truffles back out of the fridge and dip the bottom of each one in the melted dark chocolate. Place them back on the parchment or silpat lined baking sheet and return to the fridge until the dark chocolate has set.

68 comments

  1. These sound absolutely delicious! I love it when you manage to bring a recipe back from the brink. These would be perfect served after a family meal with coffee or something. Just wonderful!

  2. Def a wonderful mistake! J isnt a huge pumpkin fan either. He only likes it in one or two recipes i make. These look beautiful! I have zero artidtic skills, so im not sure that i could pull off the swirls on top

  3. These look incredible!!

  4. Pingback: White Chocolate Pumpkin Pie Bark…and a Giveaway! | She's Becoming DoughMessTic

  5. These sound amazing and look even better! I love them! I’m going to have to make them for sure :)

  6. Wowza do these look phenomenal! Happy Friday!! :)

  7. Wow, what a brilliant “mess-up!” Those look really unique, and for what it’s worth, your drizzling skills are probably loads better than mine!

  8. Those look awesome! I like the white chocolate chips!

  9. Aww wish I could have cooked with y’all!

    So was the lemon pasta dish a Rachel Ray recipe? Did it have you slice whole lemons into the sauce and top with chives? Because I made that once because I’m a lemon freak and it sounded great, but the bitter white part of the lemon flavored the whole dish terribly. I couldn’t touch it!

    It’s been driving me crazy how much a little pumpkin changes everything in a recipe. My pumpkin biscotti took almost 6 tries to get right! I assumed pumpkin was like banana, just added moisture, but no, it does something else too. Who knows?
    Anyway, glad you had a success! I think I would gobble these up too fast!

    • me too! a big cooking party would be so much fun :)

      and yes, how did you know?!? I don’t remember the exact recipe, but I’m pretty sure it was a RR recipe. It was so bad!

      Glad i’m not the only one who has trouble perfecting pumpkin recipes

  10. What a cute idea! And I think drizzle is meant to be messy, so no worrying about the waviness. They look amazing!

  11. Love these! I love it when you can salvage a “mess-up” and turn it into something else that is delicious!

  12. They look great Brandi – your piping skills were just FINE! And, more importantly, they were delicious!! (And I don’t like coffee!)

  13. pumpkin has so much moisture, it can be tough, but I love these!! i’m not a latte drinker, but I would be all over these little pumpkin gems. fun playdate idea :)

  14. Brandi! You’re photos are looking better and better!

  15. You, my dear, are crazy brilliant :) Thanks for this idea!

  16. Usually my kitchen mess ups aren’t recoverable. These look great, good job with the recovery! :)

  17. Oh I love these! They look way too good.

  18. Brilliant collaboration, sounds perfect!

  19. Wow. Just wow!!!! I’m drooling!!!!

  20. :D That is perfect finger food! Your chocolate piping work is fabulous by the way ;)

  21. Love these! Perfect fall treat!

  22. Wow wow wow! I saw these on TK. They look amazing! I can’t believe they don’t have cream cheese in them! :) Awesome! I’m pinning them right now!

  23. These truffles look pretty incredible. Great recipe and presentation!

  24. oh baby! talk about a wonderful mistake :)

    have a good weekend!

  25. holy moly…I am so making these this weekend! They’re perfect….plus, with my broken oven, I will actually be able to make something yummy! You rock!

  26. Please send me some truffles.

    Alternatively, please take a vacation to upstate New York, and we will have a big cooking party.

    • yes, yes, and yes! if i thought the truffles would make it through the mail, i would totally send you some!!

      and please. someday. we need a cooking + canning day, or weekend, or week.

  27. i really like your food pictures and want to invite you to try out tastingspot.com. it’s for anyone that just wants another place to submit photos and share it will other foodies. It’s still in beta version, but would love for you to start adding some photos and help get it going.

  28. These look fantastic! What a fun recipe.

  29. I’d say this was a cooking mess-up gone oh-so right! I love the texture of truffles way more than pumpkin bark. Love!

  30. What. Whoa.

    These look epic, Brandi. I wish I had some already made in my fridge right now!!

  31. OMG send a box to me and I’ll marry you, Brandi!!!

  32. I can’t handle how good these look and sound. Cannot wait to try them! Though I am sure mine won’t be as pretty!

  33. OMG. I don’t even like pumpkin spice lattes b/c I don’t like coffee. But I think I need to make these. Like now.

  34. These look absolutely delicious! Fall break starts tomorrow and this recipe is definitely on my to-do list!

  35. Oooh, finally I can get in on the pumpkin latte thing! I don’t actually drink coffee, but I like the flavor in desserts. These are now on my Thanksgiving list. :) And I know exactly what you mean about being able to make desserts but not being able to decorate them. It’s kind of frustrating! But I suppose what’s important is that they actually taste good.

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  37. I made these for Thanksgiving and everyone loved them! The taste was great, but it’s also super easy to make them look professionally made. I was shocked at how nice they looked and I’m terrible at decorating things! We covered ours in white chocolate, melted some milk chocolate and mixed some of that with some of the leftover white chocolate, and then drizzled some of the milk chocolate mix on top. Twelve people actually started applauding when they ate these. It was kind of silly but we all loved your recipe. Thanks! :)

    • Sorry this is so late!! My email is backed up like crazy, but thank you SO much for letting me know! I cannot even imagine people clapping over these – this seriously made my day :)

  38. Hehe. No problem. I forgot to say that my husband was the one dipping them in the white chocolate and he found it wildly amusing. He was very pleased with himself although he has no kitchen skills or desire to bake. So then, if one needs a task to give their guy, let them dip things in chocolate. :)

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  40. So I tried making these…..but once I added the pumpkin the whole consistency was SO runny that it never set. I tried it twice in a row and had the same results. Then I tried adding more chocolate to the mix and it was just grainy and still didn’t set. Any thoughts??? What am I doing wrong!? I want to eat these SO bad!

    • Hi Laura – the pumpkin definitely changes the consistency, but it shouldn’t be runny. Are you letting the mixture cool in a thin layer in the fridge before rolling them?

      • I did do that, it was still very gummy and difficult to work with. My last effort, where I added more chocolate worked a little better as far as consistency after cooling. I’m not sure what the problem is, they taste fine, though! I think next time I’ll just use a little extra chocolate from the beginning. Hopefully that’ll do the trick. Thanks for getting back to me!

        • that’s so strange! i wonder if they’re like no bake cookies where they won’t set up if the weather is too muggy. i’ll be trying them again soon and will let you know if mine turn out any different this time.

  41. I made these today and they were fantastic!! Be aware that they are very sweet. And I don’t think they make 40 unless you roll them super tiny. Fun little desserts though! Great for fall!

  42. Pingback: White Chocolate Pumpkin Spice Latte Truffles | Butter and Sprinkles

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