Assorted Brigadeiros (Brazilian Coconut & Condensed Milk Truffles)

Here is a recipe for a pretty amazing party.

- 1 large bunch of vintage metallic blue taffeta, rinsed and drained

- 15 metres of spotted tulle

- 10 buckets of white wine sangria with lychees, lemon and mint

- 10 buckets of red wine sangria with oranges

- 3 hair crimpers

- 2 cans of hairspray

- 6 rolls of streamers

- 1/2 teaspoon blue eyeshadow

- 3 Michael Jackson CD's

- assorted tapas dishes, including brigadeiros

- a sprinkle of amazing friends (thanks Rach and George!!!!)

Me and condensed milk have a little thing going on.

a little.... relationship.

It's been going on for years now, i'm proud to say we are very committed to each other. He understands me and I understand him. It's a mutual love (i'm sure).

On travels in Vietnam, I gasped at delight when I tried Vietnamese coffee, sweetened with condensed milk (may have drunk more milk than coffee much to everyone's disgust)

On hikes at Timbertop we used to carry around tubes of the stuff, sucking them dry. Our breaks weren't for water, they were for the sweet, sticky tubes at the bottom of our backpacks.

Naturally I jumped at the chance to try and make these little balls of condensed milk goodness, infused with coconut milk and rolled in assorted goodies.

I have wanted to incorporate pop rocks into a dessert dish for aaaaages, I tried sprinkling them on the tops of macarons, but that was an epic fail. The sugar melted the shell of the macaron in the oven much to my horror, I thought the idea was genius!

Biting into a condensed milk truffle rolled in pop rocks is my idea of a pretty good time, so I tried it out. It worked! The only minor problem was when I put them in the fridge, the sugar melted a little bit, although in the end it the pop was still there.

I rolled the others in toasted coconut (my next favourite) and little "chocettes". Chewy, Gooey and moorish as hell.

Assorted Brigadeiros (Brazilian Coconut & Condensed Milk Truffles):

adapted from the New York Times

makes approx. 25 truffles

1 cup sweetened condensed milk

1/4 cup coconut milk

2 tablespoons corn syrup (glucose syrup)

2 tablespoons butter

pinch of salt

desiccated coconut (dry toasted for 5 minutes in a fry pan)

chocettes (or chocolate vermicelli)

pop rocks

Place the condensed milk, coconut milk, corn syrup, butter and salt in a medium saucepan over high heat. Bring the mixture to the boil then turn down the heat to medium and whisk constantly until the mixture thickens considerably (it will look kind of like fudge) and turns a beige caramel colour (similar to dulce de leche, about 10-15 mins). The mixture will pull away from the bottom of the pan, leaving a brown residue at the bottom, when this occurs, pour the mixture into a bowl leaving the residue behind.

Let cool to room temperature, cover with cling wrap and refrigerate for 4 hours or overnight. When set, scoop out approx. 1 tablespoon amounts of the mixture and roll into balls in slightly moist hands. Roll each ball in a coating of your choice, then place in mini cupcake wrappers, refrigerate until use, these are better eaten slighty cold.