mugwort & rose truffles

In the month of March I started studying and building a relationship with mugwort. I’ve been working through all different ways to use and connect with this magical plant through a collaboration with my friend Danielle. Plant Magick Society is a club or sorts- we study a special plant each month through recipes, ritual & meditation (amongst other things). This is a recipe that she shared for a mugwort infused chocolate treat. For this recipe I made my own mugwort tincture that I had infusing for about a month. At the end I’ll share my method for preparing the tincture. I love this recipe because it has simple but powerful ingredients. As mugwort can help with lucid dreaming & connecting to intuition, I like this as a before bed sweet snack.

INGREDIENTS

makes 6

Truffles: 

8 medjool dates 

2 TBS soft coconut oil 

3 TBS cacao powder 

1 tsp rose water (sub vanilla extract if needed) 

Mugwort tincture (see step 3 for options)

Chocolate Shell: 

¾ chocolate bar or 1/3c chocolate chips 

½ TBS coconut oil 

rose petals for sprinkling 

MAKE IT!

1. Begin by placing dates in warm water for 5-10 minutes. When they are soft remove the  stem and the pit.  

2. Put the dates along with the softened coconut oil, cacao, and rose water into your food  processor.  

3. You can make truffles all with a set amount of mugwort by adding into the food  processor now. Decide how much you want to ingest with each truffle and add directly  to your mixture. 5 drops each truffle would be 30 drops total. If you want to experiment  with varying amounts of mugwort see step 6.

4. Turn your food processor on and combine until it begins to form a ball.  

5. Scrape the sides of the food processor and turn out into a bowl. Take 1 TBS of truffle  mixture and form into a rough ball. Wet hands can help here if too sticky. Form ~6  truffles and place them on a parchment lined tray. 

6. If you want to add mugwort directly to each truffle you can do so now. Poke a hole into  the center of each truffle and drop your tincture directly into the truffle. I made 2 truffles  with 5 drops, 2 with 7 drops and 2 with 10 drops. This method will not allow for more  than 10 drops directly into the truffles.  

7. Place the tray in the freezer for 15 minutes for the truffles to firm up while you create the  chocolate shell. 

Chocolate Shell:  

1. Put chocolate and coconut oil into a double boiler or microwave safe dish. Heat on the  stove over low until melted, stirring occasionally to combine. If you microwave do so in  intervals of 15-30 seconds depending on your microwave, stirring in between, ensuring  your chocolate doesn’t burn. 

2. Pull the truffles from the freezer and roll  into balls with your hands. Dry hands are  

best for this step. Take a fork & dip each truffle in the chocolate, letting the excess drip off. Place  

on a parchment lined tray. Sprinkle with  rose petals after chocolate has a chance to  set for about 1 minute.  

3. Store in refrigerator. I like to let mine  come to room temperature before  enjoying.

MUGWORT TINCTURE'

To make my mugwort tincture I added ground dried mugwort to a mason jar and poured enough vodka on top to cover by about an inch. A higher proof alcohol (like 100 proof) will extract more of a plants volatile compounds, but I just used what was readily available. Seal up your jar and put it in the pantry for about a month, giving it a shake every so often. After 4-6 weeks you can strain and bottle this up, and it should have a pretty darn long shelf life (think like… multiple years).