You guys complained about our recipes not having enough alcohol in them, so here you go, you magnificent lushes, you. Eat your rum balls.
Generally speaking, when you cook a recipe with alcohol, the libations cook down and you're left with the essence of bourbon. This does not happen with rum balls, because at no point do you actually cook the part of the dish with alcohol in it. What winds up happening is you eat delicious (not-actually-)baked goods and, if you did it right, get pleasantly sloshed enough to have a much easier time dealing with your one Uncle who won't stop talking about a flat tax. Because of this, though, you should probably avoid serving this to minors. Unless you're AWESOME. NO, WE ARE JOKING, WONKETTE IS NOT ENDORSING THE DELINQUENCY OF A MINOR, NICE MR. OR MS. BATF AGENT.
Anyway, for those of LEGAL DRINKING AGE, rum balls are delicious and easy, so you should do this thing.
Ingredients!
How To Foods!
1. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit (or 41 deciliters).
2. Grind up the ginger snaps. A food processor helps here, although you can do it by hand. A 14 oz package (dry weight, which is why this doesn't match up to the fact that 1 cup = 8 oz) was about perfect in our case.
3. Pour the hazelnuts into a baking dish. Once the oven is heated, cook them for around 10 minutes. They'll be done when the skins crack.
4. Take the hazelnuts out and put them on half of a tea towel. Fold the other half on top of them and rub the nuts (STOP GIGGLING) so the skins come off. Then place the nuts in a colander and rinse off more of the skin fragments. They don't need to be perfect, but you want to get rid of as much of the skin as possible.
5. Put the hazelnuts in a dry skillet, then cook on medium heat. Stir and cook until the nuts start to darken (generally around 5-8 minutes).
6. Grind the nuts to a coarse grind. Again, a food processor makes this easier.
7. Pour the crushed ginger snaps into a dry mixing bowl. Add cocoa powder, 1 cup ground hazelnuts, and 1 cup confectioner's sugar. Whisk together.
8. Pour 3/4 cup confectioner's sugar and and 1/2 ground hazelnuts (the remaining amount) onto a plate. blend them into each other and spread evenly.
9. Add rum and honey to the dry mixing bowl. You can warm up the honey to make it pour easier, and be sure to oil your measuring device so the honey doesn't stick. Whisk everything together until it holds together in a giant mass. If you want to make them heavier on alcohol (and of course you do), feel free to play with the honey-to-rum ratio.
10. Wet your hands, then gather a walnut-sized piece of the mixture (you can do smaller, if you want smaller rum balls). Roll them in the hazelnut/sugar mix. Repeat with all of the mixture.
11. Refrigerate until you're ready to eat. If you give it a full couple of days, the flavors intensify and the rum attains nuclear potency.
Voila! There are your rum balls. Now go get hammered off dessert treats.
