The Difference Between Truffles & Bonbons
What’s the difference between chocolate truffles and bonbons?
I will just say for the record, both are delicious! The main difference though, is that truffles are rolled, and bonbons are not. The contents or ingredients of them is not what sets them apart, as opposed to what you might read elsewhere.
What is a bonbon?
Bonbons being unmoulded.
How bonbons are made
A bonbon is a chocolate or chocolate confection made following these steps:
A thin shell of chocolate is made by casting a mould with multiple little cavities. The shell is hollow, and upside down.
This shell is then filled with a liquid ganache, which is allowed to set.
Once set, the ganache is covered in chocolate (capped), and allowed to set. This encloses the soft ganache center in the shell.
Then they are popped out as seen here in the picture, and they are ready to be sold!
The mould can be sprayed or painted with coloured cocoa butter before step one. This is what makes bonbons extra shiny, and gives them all those bright beautiful colours as seen in the image here.
Bonbon Fillings
The bonbons can be filled with a simple ganache of cream and chocolate. They can also be filled with 2 different ganaches, a ganache and a nut inside, ganache and a fruit compote, caramel, etc.
What is a truffle?
The dark balls in the back are traditional simple truffles. They are made by rolling a stiff ganache into balls and dusting them in cocoa powder.
How Truffles Are Made
Truffles can be made in various ways, but they always end up rolled.
A) The simplest, traditional method:
Make a ganache, and allow it to set.
Pinch it and roll the ganache into balls.
These balls can then be rolled into cocoa powder.
These are usually round, but sometimes they can be random odd shapes where the ganache is just pinched and tossed into the coating.
B) Truffles with a rolled chocolate shell:
Make a ganache, and allow it to set.
Pinch it and roll the ganache into balls.
These balls are then rolled with chocolate a few times to create a chocolate shell.
On the last roll of chocolate, they are often thrown into a coating of cocoa powder or some other coating that the chocolate will adhere to.
These truffles are the same as the traditional ones, but with a hard chocolate shell surrounding the ganache.
As well, they do not have to be round. The ganache can also be cut into rectangles or piped into a cylinder shape. These are then rolled into chocolate and into a coating of cocoa powder, nuts, etc.
These truffles were made using premade spherical shells, filled, and then coated with various coatings.
C) Pre-made shells, filled then rolled:
Most truffles in chocolate shops today, especially chocolatier shops, are made in this way:
Premade spherical shells with a narrow hole at the top are laid out.
The shells are then filled through the hole with a ganache. They can also be filled with caramels, two layers of different ganaches, and more, just like a bonbon!
Once the ganache sets, they holes are plugged with a drop of chocolate.
These shelled truffles are then rolled in chocolate and coated with cocoa powder, sugar, nuts, or anything that will adhere.
As mentioned in step two, the fillings can be the same as bonbons. They also both have a hard chocolate shell. The difference is how they are finished. The truffles are always rolled into some sort of coating. Using premade shells for truffles allows you more flexibility when it comes to its contents.
Truffles made in A or B have to be a firm ganache. Truffles made in C can be firm, soft, or liquid (especially in the case of a caramel).
What about enrobed or dipped chocolates?
Good question. These are made by cutting blocks of chocolate ganache, often in squares, and then hand dipped into a bowl of chocolate to coat the outside, or ran through a conveyor belt that covers them in a shower of chocolate. The end result is the same. A soft ganache center surrounded by a hard chocolate shell. They can be one simple ganache, they can be multi layered ganaches, or they can even be a firm caramel.
But are these truffles or bonbons? In my experience, they are most often referred to as bonbons. It’s sort of a reverse made bonbons. In bonbons, the shell is made, then filled with ganache. Here, the ganache is made, and then enrobed with a chocolate shell. However, at no point are they rolled like a truffle. So if we had to squeeze these into one of the two categories, I would call them bonbons. You can also call them enrobed chocolates.
Recap
Both bonbons and truffles are chocolate confections. As you can see, the contents, coatings, the presence of a chocolate shell or not (in the case of truffles), can vary quite a bit. In the end, the difference is how they are made (truffles are always rolled), not what is contained within them.