Beer of the week - Hotel Chocolat Beer Truffles

We are just past Christmas and the house is still full of chocolate. It's also full of beer; both situations the effect of over-ambitious ordering and generous gifts.

Hotel Chocolat have done a good job of combining these two household favourites with their beer truffles.

A crisp crack of milk chocolate yields to a creamy, boozy, white chocolate ganache. It's subtly enriched with familiar Belgian beer flavours of malt and banana rounded off by an intriguing hoppy bitterness.

I've tasted a fair bit of beer based confectionery and I think these truffles come the closest to properly capturing the flavours of beer in this format. Maybe not one for a chocolate connoisseur and they certainly won't satisfy your thirst, but for a bit of festive fun they hit the mark.

Maybe a kind gift for a beer fan who is abstaining for January!