I got this recipe from the book of recipes of Aunt Helia, beloved sister-in-law of Aunt Lina, who kept all the family recipes.
I remember that when she brought these sweets to Rome as a present, Aunt Lina would sit with my grandmother Irene in the living room drinking tea and after a few minutes they would laugh in a tight Venetian dialect. We children couldn’t even get close to those sweets. Looking back at the photos and the recipe, I know realize the bonbons have a very high alcoholic content.

Aunt Lina's BonBon

  • Preparation time: 20 minutes
  • Ingredients for 60 bonbon
  • Difficulty: Easy recipe

  • Ingredients
  • For the bonbon:
  • 200 gr or 7 oz of toasted and chopped almonds
  • 200 gr or 7 oz of extra-fine sugar
  • 3 yolks from boiled eggs
  • 75 gr or 3 oz of crumbled biscuits
  • 50 gr or 2 oz of extra dark chocolate
  • 50 gr or 2 oz of butter
  • 1 small glass of rum (about 60 ml or ¼ cup)
  • For decoration:
  • 50 gr or 2 oz of toasted almonds and chopped to wrap the balls
  1. Instructions
  2. Place the almonds on a baking sheet. Toast them in a hot oven at 250° F for around fifteen minutes, turning them occasionally to create a uniform toasting. Remove from the oven and leave to cool. In a food processor, roughly chop the almonds when they are cold.
  3. Melt the chocolate in a bain-marie in a small saucepan. The bain-marie is a method of cooking in a container not in direct contact with the fire but immersed in water kept at the desired temperature. In this case, place the pan with the chocolate in another pan filled with water.
  4. Crumble the biscuits.
  5. Sift the boiled egg yolks through a sieve.
  6. Whisk the butter with the sugar in a bowl with a whisk. Add the egg yolks, the melted chocolate, and then the crumbled biscuits and the chopped almonds. Finally, add the rum until the mixture is workable.
  7. Make a dough with small balls of 10 grams or ½ oz each and pass them through the chopped almonds.

Tips to ensure the success of the dish:

  • If you want these bonbons to have a lower alcoholic content, you can halve the dose of rum and replace it with additional dark chocolate.
  • If you want even more delicious balls, you can melt another 50 gr or 2 oz of chocolate and dip them in chocolate before rolling them in the chopped almonds.

Aunt Helia recipe book