Chocolate Ganache

Not the most glamorous picture, but it will have to do. For my darling, chocolate-addict friend (who is also a huge fan of this! and this!) I made this little birthday dessert I like to call "Chocolate Never Dies."

Fudge cupcakes with dark chocolate chips (60% cacao) topped with dark chocolate ganache. Did you swoon? If not, re-read that last sentence.

Glad you're back.

Ganache can be used as a filling, a glaze, or a "frosting" and is just sinfully good in any of its forms. To get the ganache thick enough to pipe out of a piping bag onto cupcakes, I read about six recipes and came up with this. (Most recipes are pretty much the same, so if you already know how to make ganache, prepare to not be surprised by my recipe.)

Ganache

Here's What You Need:

1 T Butter
1 Scant Cup of Heavy Cream
1 Cup of Chocolate Chips, or roughly chopped chocolate. I used the Ghirardelli 60% cacao chips and it turned out amazingly dark and delicious.

Here's What You Do:

1. Chop your chocolate, or open your bag of chocolate chips. Measure it out into a medium bowl.
2. In a small saucepan bring the heavy cream and butter to a boil.
3. Pour the heavy cream over the chocolate.
4. Slowly mix the chocolate and the cream until they become one dark chocolately liquid.
5. Once all the cream is incorporated, you can put the ganache in the fridge if you want it to thicken a little faster (takes about 45 mins if your fridge is quite cold), or you can leave it on the counter. I like to give it a stir every 10-15 mins to make sure it's cooling evenly.
6. Enjoy.

*Note, for runnier ganache, add a little more heavy cream. This would be fantastic poured over the top of a bundt cake or as the coating or center of home made truffles.