Plum and Licorice bonbon filling

My grandma had several plum trees and come plum season I would often go home with a big bag of plums. Us Dutch also love licorice and it turns out, plum and licorice are a match made in heaven!
These chocolates are part of the Dutch chocolate series and they’re filled with a crunchy speculaas layer, topped with creamy caramel.
This recipe does not include how to make the shells. You can find instructions in the Tips and Tricks under the Kitchen Log. I made the shells for these chocolates from Ruby chocolate.

Ingredients:

For the plum jam:

  • 200gr ripe plums
  • 5gr pectin powder
  • 60gr dextrose

For the licorice ganache:

  • 70gr dark chocolate
  • 20gr sorbitol
  • 25gr bay leaf licorice
  • 40gr heavy cream
  • 10gr licorice syrup

Makes enough for 1 full mould

Recipe:

Make the plum jam:
Take the stones out of the plums. Put the plums, pectin and dextrose in a sauce pan. Heat until the plums are softened. Blend with a stick blender. Leave to cool to 30°C or lower (not too cool or the jam wil set) before piping to avoid the shell from melting. Fill half of the shell with the plum jam.

Make the licorice ganache:
Chop the bay leaf licorice as fine as you can. Heat the cream and bay leaf licorice to 80-90°C. Leave to infuse for an hour. Stir well, then strain out the licorice.
Heat the cream back to 80-90°C. Pour this over the chocolate, dextrose and licorice syrup and leave for two minutes to soften the chocolate. Take a stick blender and blend the ganache until smooth and shiny.
Pipe the ganache into the moulds when the temperature is 25-30°C. Too cold and the ganache will be too solid.