Martha Stewart's easy chocolate truffles are delicious, minimal effort, and need just 3 ingredients. Here's how to make them.

On my eternal quest for food inspiration, I happened to stumble across a recipe from Martha Stewart's website, which promised easy chocolate truffles. Requiring just three ingredients and minimal effort, they seemed too good to be true.

From a first glance, the recipe seems to solely rely on a chocolate ganache, which is effectively just heavy cream mixed with melted chocolate. As I had never made truffles before, I was intrigued as I thought there would be more steps.

Requiring only around 10 minutes of work and a short time in the refrigerator, I decided to test the recipe out myself.

To make around a dozen truffles, you'll need:

• 100g, or 3.5 ounces, heavy cream
• 100g, or 3.5 ounces, semi-sweet chocolate
• Unsweetened cocoa powder, for coating
• Pinch of kosher salt.

I did make a few adjustments to the recipe, particularly as the one on Martha's website makes around five dozen truffles, which was a little excessive to justify for just one person.

This version has just one-fifth of the original measurements, which also means it's easier to scale up and down. Some of the measurements were also converted from volume to weight, for simplification.

The original recipe also called for vanilla extract as an optional extra, but it works just as well without it in my opinion.

Keep an eye on the heat, stirring occasionally to stop a film from forming on the cream.

As there aren't many ingredients, the chocolate you use for this recipe will heavily affect the eventual taste. I went for high-quality milk chocolate, with around 37% cocoa, which is probably about as little cocoa as you'd want to go.

Make sure the bowl you're using is heatproof.

Using a spatula or a spoon, fold the warm cream mixture into the chocolate pieces to start melting it.

You'll know when you're finished when there are no lumps or solid pieces of chocolate left in the ganache.

The mixture will have thickened slightly by the time the chocolate has melted, but will still be almost syrupy.

I like to use two teaspoons to get them in roughly the right shape, alternatively, Stewart also suggests using a melon baller in her recipe.

Don't worry if the truffles aren't perfectly spherical at this point, just make sure they're all roughly the same size.

To shape the truffles into spheres, take one at a time and roll them between the palm of your hands until they are in a ball shape.

I always find it easiest to shape the truffles while they're covered in cocoa powder as they're less likely to stick to your hands.

Sealed in an airtight container in the refrigerator, these truffles will last up to two weeks, or as long as you can hold off from eating them — whichever comes first.

Given how little effort, time, and ingredients these took, I'm seriously impressed with the results of this recipe. Like many Martha Stewart recipes, this one was far greater than the sum of its parts.

Next time, I'll probably add some of the optional extras listed in the original recipe to coat the truffles, such as desiccated coconut or chopped nuts, which would be just as delicious.

As the recipe doesn't require any specialist equipment or technique, it may be a great way to impress someone else regardless of how confident you are in the kitchen. Alternatively, they're just as good as a treat to yourself — Valentine's Day is overrated anyway.