If you’re looking for the easiest 4-Ingredient Christmas treat, these Chocolate Rum Balls are it!
Rum balls take less than 20 minutes to throw together OR even less if you get the kids involved! NO BAKING required and NO need to melt any CHOCOLATE! These little rich and decadent Chocolate Rum Balls are our very own quintessential Christmas treat in Australia, where chocolate and coconut meet condensed milk and crushed wafers or cookies!
A hint of rum makes these the BEST treats to give as gifts OR serve to your guests!
RUM BALLS
Easy to make, I bet you have the ingredients necessary in your kitchen cupboards to make these right now!
The rum part to be optional in this recipe, as many of our readers aren’t comfortable giving treats with alcohol to their kids. Of course, these balls are AMAZING with or without rum! Or you can make half a batch with rum (1 tablespoon is enough for a half batch), and half a batch without! I’ll leave that part totally up to you.
Biting into these Rum balls is one blissful bite after the next.
What You Need To Make Chocolate Coconut Rum Balls
- Condensed Milk: for the sake of saving some serious calories, I used Nestle Reduced Sugar Sweetened Condensed Milk, but you can use any type, really.
- Desiccated (or finely shredded) coconut.
- Cocoa powder.
- Plain sweet cookies: the type you dunk into your tea or coffee. Vanilla wafers, milk arrowroot, or even plain chocolate cookies.
- A couple tablespoons of rum: as I mentioned earlier, this is optional and can be added to only half of the batch instead of the entire batch if you’re hesitant to serve them to children. Having said that, most of us grew up eating Rum balls at Christmas parties and we turned out fine! You can also use whisky or bourbon.
How To Make Rum Balls
- Place your cookies in a large ziplock bag and crush them with a rolling pin. You could also crush them in a food processor if you wish! We prefer the rolling pin method because we love some larger cookie pieces in our balls!
- Then, add all of your ingredients into a large bowl
3. You can start off mixing with a wooden spoon but may need to use your hands once the mixture becomes too thick. Once it’s thick, please don’t add any more liquids to it! It needs to be thick enough so once it refrigerates, it sets into a truffle-like ball.
4. Then, roll into a ball by the tablespoonful
5. Roll each rum ball in coconut and place them on a tray to refrigerate.
Good LUCK not eating any Rum balls while you make them.
That’s it! The easiest truffle Rum balls recipe on the planet without needing to melt any chocolate. Perfect for gifts OR as an after dinner mint without the mint!
More Christmas Treats!
Churro Nutella Christmas Tree
Hot Fudge Chocolate Pudding Cake
Quick Soft Cinnamon Rolls
Rum Balls
Ingredients
For Chocolate Coconut Balls:
- 9 ounces vanilla wafers cookies or plain chocolate cookies
- 14 ounces sweetened condensed milk I use Nestle
- 3 tablespoons rum optional
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- ½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder I use Hershey's
- ½ cup desiccated coconut or finely shredded
- 1 pinch salt
For Coating:
- ¾ cup desiccated coconut or finely shredded
Instructions
- Set up a work station with a large ziplock bag and rolling pin (or a food processor); a large bowl for mixing; and a shallow bowl with ¾ cup of coconut for rolling in.
- Place the cookies in ziplock bag, seal and crush with the rolling pin. Alternatively, crush in the food processor until fine crumbs form. It's ok if there are some slightly larger pieces.
- Add the crushed cookies, coconut, cocoa powder, condensed milk, rum and vanilla to the large bowl. Mix the ingredients well using a wooden spoon, then your hands once it gets too thick. (If mixture is too thick, mix in 1-2 tablespoons milk).
- Scoop out a tablespoonful of mixture and roll into a 1 - 1 ½ inch ball, then roll in coconut until completely covered. Place on a baking sheet or tray and repeat until all the mixture has been rolled into balls.
- Refrigerate until ready to serve.
irene Cruickshank says
It turned out perfect, I am making 3 batches one rum done yeah, two brandy and the third whisky, the question is will I stop there? Thank you for making the recipe so easy.
Karina says
Haha I love your dedication! Who knows where the flavor journey will take you next? Thanks for making it a fun experiment, and cheers to your mixologist skills!