Don Draper Truffles

Author Notes

Bold, dark and boozy. That’s how I like my men and my truffles. I was still at the agency when Mad Men first premiered and fully supported the waves of accolades that followed. Like most I couldn’t resist falling for the sexy, brooding, borderline alcoholic Don Draper. What better way to gear up for the upcoming 7th season this spring than combining my two favorite things: chocolate and booze.


Truffles are a great way to impress people with really minimal effort. When you realize how easy they are to make, the possibilities of creativity are endless. The base for truffles is a ganache, and there are only three main rules to making a good ganache: using a ratio of 2:1 chocolate to heavy cream (by weight), using good quality chocolate, and allowing the ganache to set before handling. Now, if you’ve done your homework and discovered the excuse that there are health benefits to eating dark chocolate, which include it being a great source of antioxidants, lowering blood pressure, and actually having a very low Glycemic index (something my diabetic husband constantly reminds me of when whole bars disappear from our pantry). As long we are talking chocolate that is 70% coco solids or higher don’t feel so guilty using the good stuff.

Regarding the booze, if you are a Mad Men fan you will know that the only monogamous relationship Don maintains is with his Old Fashioneds (yes that is the plural of Old Fashioned). The history of the Old Fashioned is an interesting one and more or less the history of cocktails in American so to speak. At the dawn of the 19th century before prohibition, a rudimentary cocktail was mixture of a particular spirit, sugar, bitters, and water. Back then a bartender would moisten a cube of sugar with house made bitters, drop in a perfectly cut ice, and hand you the glass with your choice of spirit to pour your own drink. Prohibition changed alot of the drinking culture in America and popularized flavored liqueurs, syrups, and even fruit garnishes to help cover up the low grade quality of the alcohol at the time. After the repeal of the prohibition the sugary concoctions carried on, but those that preferred a more classic drink, such as two fingers of Rye Whiskey with a cube of sugar and angostura bitters, would merely request a “whiskey old-fashioned”. By the mid century whiskey and bourbon were so common that the spirit was dropped from the name all together. And there you have it folks, another example of why Don Draper is so much cooler than all of us.

Like our protagonist, these truffles may have a shiny and hard exterior but inside they are a bittersweet, melt-in-your-mouth mush with dare I say emotional complexity. And don’t be fooled by their size, they pack enough sauce to make them legally over the limit. Might as well make an afternoon of it and pour yourself a drink while you roll these guys out. If for some reason they are not gone within an hour, you can store them in the fridge for up to a week, just bring them back to room temperature before serving. So go on and do what Don does best: indulge. —Madhuri Sharma