This recipe seems doable and sounds incredible. It also has great reviews. http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/r...ws/views/109085

CARAMEL-DARK CHOCOLATE TRUFFLES WITH FLEUR DE SEL
20 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, finely chopped, divided
1/3 cup sugar
2 tablespoons water
2/3 cup whipping cream
1/4 teaspoon fleur de sel

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
Additional fleur de sel
Place 8 ounces chocolate in metal bowl over saucepan of barely simmering water (do not allow bottom of bowl to touch water); stir until chocolate is smooth. Remove chocolate from over water.

Combine sugar and 2 tablespoons water in small saucepan. Stir over medium heat until sugar dissolves, occasionally brushing sides of pan with wet pastry brush. Increase heat; boil until syrup is deep amber color, brushing down sides and swirling pan occasionally, about 4 minutes. Add cream (mixture will bubble). Stir over very low heat until caramel is smooth. Mix caramel and 1/4 teaspoon fleur de sel into melted chocolate. Chill until truffle filling is firm, at least 3 hours.

Place cocoa in bowl. Using 1 tablespoon truffle filling for each truffle, roll into balls, then roll in cocoa. Arrange on baking sheet. Cover; chill overnight.

Line 13x9x2-inch baking sheet with foil. Place remaining 12 ounces chocolate in medium metal bowl over saucepan of barely simmering water (do not allow bottom of bowl to touch water); stir until chocolate is melted and smooth and thermometer inserted into chocolate registers 115°F. Remove bowl from over water. Working quickly, submerge 1 truffle in melted chocolate. Using fork, lift out truffle and tap fork against side of bowl to allow excess coating to drip off. Transfer truffle to prepared sheet. Repeat with remaining truffles. Sprinkle truffles lightly with additional fleur de sel. Let stand until coating sets, at least 1 hour. (Can be made 1 week ahead. Cover and chill. Bring to room temperature before serving.)




Now this recipe, as written, according to my fitday has 208g carbs and 70g fiber and makes 32 truffles which would make each truffle about 4.3g carbs. (I used lindt 85% in my calculations)

Now... If I remove the sugar it cuts the carb counts by half leaving it at around 2.2g carbs per truffle (which means I can have 2-3 truffles)

The question is, should I just make a caramel with polyd and sweetzfree? Should I try and use erythritol? Any ideas on how to make this recipe work while keeping the carbs down?

Also, if I switch the Lindt to Chocoperfection bars it would have 1 carb per truffle but I really had a bad experience with the chocoperfection bars and I am not sure I would like to repeat it.

As usual, any and all suggestions will be helpful!

I'd stick with the highest percentage Lindt (90% if looking in the right place) I can find, or use a very good unsweetened, Ghirardhelli or Scharffenberger.

I'm not convinced that the caramel syrup adds that much flavour to the party, at a 1/3 cup of sugar. Not that couldn't probably be easily replaced by a hint of a quality Caramel flavour or extract if you don't have PDX. If you DO have PDX, just a straight-up sweetened (sweetzfree or the like) PDX caramel will do the trick, no real need to add the complications of E (recrystallization, etc.) that I can see. Just need to add enough sweetener to bring the chocolate up to the required sweetness...

The rest is pretty much the same, right? i.e., no changes needed to the cocoa or the fleur del sel...

Yum indeed.

OK - I'm going to display my ignorance here! What kind of salt is "fleur de sel"? Flower of salt???

Thanks, Glenda

From Wikipedia ...

Fleur de sel ("Flower of salt" in French) is a hand-harvested sea salt collected by workers who scrape only the top layer of salt before it sinks to the bottom of large salt pans. Traditional French fleur de sel is collected off the coast of Brittany, and is slightly grey due to the sandy minerals collected in the process of harvesting the salt from the pans.

edit: if you are ignorant, you are in good company - I had no clue, and I really still don't. Meaning - even if I wanted to buy it, I would not know where to start.

Thanks wannadanc! Sort of begs the question - not only where to buy, but why? Wouldn't just ordinary, garden-variety sea-salt work just as well? Or (sorry to offend finer sensibilities here) how about just plain old kosher salt?? Or maybe table salt, iodized, would be closer?? I think maybe I'll stick to the basic Atkins recipe for truffles in my 1992 DANDR - no salt at all!!

Glenda

It's a "finishing" salt, it's in larger flakier type crystals that almost fizz a little on the tongue. The salt version of spiffy rock sugar crystals.



So in this case, no, definitely NOT, plain old ordinary (small crystalled refined iodine-added) salt won't do, and most especially iodized tablesalt. That would just dissolve into it not lay on top and make it just plain salty.

I've got a nice finishing salt I really like, big flakes, fizzy, the Maldon sea salt. I've also got coarse sea salt and regular fine sea salt I use instead of iodized refined salt. They each have their uses.

It's kind of like the difference between Baker's Unsweetened and the Scharffenberger, it's qualitative, yet technically both are pretty much the same thing. Not so in the texture and the taste.

And a good fleur de sel can be found in most delis or even health food stores, or of course gourmet stores. Prices vary widely depending on the store. It pays to shop around a bit.

Here's an interesting sea salt guide, categorized (see the finishing salts) and with good pics. It's quite interesting, really.
http://www.saltworks.us/salt_info/s...t_reference.asp