I find joy in making just about anything, but desserts and sweets are without a doubt my favorite. When researching Brazil, Brigadeiro came up as a traditional candy to make. It looked simple enough so I thought I would give it a shot. These treats are ridiculously easy! Messy – but easy!
The best way to describe these delicious little balls would be to imagine caramel and chocolate mixed together in a soft and chewy nougat rolled in sprinkles or nuts. They practically melt in your mouth.
The best part of this recipe is the short list of ingredients: sweetened condensed milk, butter, cocoa and whatever you want to roll the nougat in.
Mix your sweetened condensed milk, butter and cocoa on the stove for about ten minutes until it thickens.
The end result will look like this picture above. Almost like a fudge. I let this sit in the fridge for about half an hour to cool so that I could roll it.
Once the mixture cools, you are ready to roll. Since I have a lot of chocolate sprinkles left over from the Hagelslag I made recently and it is one of the traditional toppings for Brigadeiro, I decided to use it along with some chopped hazelnuts.
The rolling process is very messy as the mixture never quite stiffens, no matter how long you leave it in the fridge. I thought for sure this would harden after 24 hours in the fridge, but the candy maintained its delightful gooey texture.
I loved these sweets so much I’m going to make them around the holidays to give away as gifts. They are very easy to make and look great.
The Brigadeiro recipe I used was from All Recipes.
Brigadeiro
3 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa
1 Tablespoon butter
1 (14 ounce) can sweetened condensed milk
Toppings
Instructions
1. Place a medium saucepan on medium heat.
2. Add cocoa, butter and sweetened condensed milk.
3. Cook and continue to stir about 10 minutes until mixture is thickened.
4. Remove from heat and let cool.
5. Once the mixture is cool roll into balls and coat in chocolate sprinkles, nuts, coconut or leave plain.
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