Looking for a chocolate ganache recipe that’s both simple and delicious? You’ve come to the right place. If you’re seeking an even quicker method, consider our simple two-ingredient chocolate ganache recipe.

How to Make a Silky Chocolate Ganache

Today on Crispybake Kitchen,
I’m showing you how to make a silky chocolate ganache.
So let’s get started.
To make this recipe, you’ll need some nice chocolate
and cream, but I’m gonna show you how to make this ganache
with different liquids too.

Ingredients

◯ four ounces of semi-sweet chocolate
◯ half a cup of cream

Chopping Chocolate & Scalding Cream

First off, I’m giving my chocolate a chop.
This is a silky, amazing soup of chocolate.
It’s really versatile, but a ton of things can go wrong,
so I want to show you everything that can go wrong
so you don’t waste your chocolate.
Starting off with four ounces of semi-sweet chocolate
for this recipe, you could use chocolate chips,
but you want to make sure it’s a nicer brand of chocolate
because if it has a bunch of addons and fillers in,
it’s not gonna melt as easily.
There’s a higher chance it could break
where it gets grainy and it’s not smooth.
So go ahead, use a nicer chocolate,
it’s the main ingredient, and you will notice the difference.
Ooh, giving this a nice, a good chop.
I don’t want giant pieces in here
because you want everything to melt at the same rate.
Chop, chop, chop, chop.
Today I’m using a semi-sweet chocolate.
You could go even darker, but I’ve noticed
from experience dark chocolates with a lot of cacao in them,
just tend to break more easily and it’s really frustrating.
So I like to stick with semi-sweet.
All right, this looks pretty good.
It doesn’t have to be powder, but you just want smaller pieces.
This is set aside, and now we’re gonna add
the cream.

You can use a microwave for this.
I’m gonna do this on a stove top
just because I have more control, that makes me happy.
The easiest way to make ganache is called scalding.
So you’re gonna get the cream really hot
just before it boils and we’ll pour it over the chocolate.
So I chopped four ounces of chocolate.
That’s about one cup, meaning I want half a cup of cream.
You usually use a two-tone ratio.
So one part liquid, two parts chocolate.
You can alter this and add more liquid
for a more running ganache or less liquid
for a thicker ganache that sets up a little bit nicer.
Thicker ganaches are used for things like chocolate truffles,
which are delicious.
Thinner ganaches are more for pouring.
So let’s take this and get onto some heat.

While our cream’s heating up,
you want to grab a glass bowl or a metal bowl
and something to stir with.
That is not a whisk.
You don’t use a whisk to make a ganache
because it beats way too much air in there.
You want it to be silky smooth, like hot chocolate,
but thicker and keep an eagle eye on your cream.
We’re only using half of a cup.
It heats up super quick.
And what happens when it comes to a boil
is it boils over and makes a giant mess.
It’s just starting to bubble at the edges.
You can give it a swirl
and once that comes to a bubble one more time,
we’re ready to pour.

Our cream’s nice and hot.
I’m adding all of my chocolates into a bowl.
Now, I’m pouring my hot, scalded cream
right over the chocolate
and you’ll see a lot of it melts right away,
but some of those slight larger pieces
are gonna be a bit stubborn.
Give it a little shake, just like that
to move the chocolate around.
And you can let this sit for a while.
I like to cover it too.
You can grab just about anything.
It just covers it up so it retains some of the heat.
This is gonna set for about four to five minutes.
Just let it melt the chocolate and the main thing is,
you don’t want to burn the chocolate.
If you burn the chocolate,
the ganache’s gonna get ruined.
It’s like there’s no way to come back
if the chocolate burns.
So we’re using low heat to really melt it slowly.
If you don’t want to use your stove
and you want to do the microwave,
go ahead and just put your cream in this bowl,
microwave it on low power in short bursts.
And once it starts to come to a boil,
like almost starting to boil when it’s scalded,
pour the chocolate in and cover it up.
It works just the same.

Ganache Variations: Water Ganache & More

I get a ton of questions about how to make a ganache
without using cream.
And the answer is you can use milk, you could use coffee,
you can use water.
So I want to show you how to make a water ganache.
It actually comes in really handy.
And a lot of times when we can’t get cream,
you might pan it like, oh, I can’t make this recipe,
but you can make it with almost any liquid
and you can add other things into the liquid too.
So if I was making some truffles for me,
I could use cream and add some bourbon or rum to that.
And it makes them delicious.
Just a couple tablespoons is all you need.

While this melts away, I’m gonna make the water ganache
and show you how easy it is.

Ingredients for Water Ganache

◯ one cup chocolate chips
◯ half a cup of water

So for my water ganache,
I’m actually gonna use chocolate chips.
One cup, using the same two to one ratio.
And I’m using a double boiler.
So I have some water simmering in a small pot over there.
Half a cup of water, right into the chocolate chips.
And we’re gonna be stirring over heat.
So come on over, this looks so wrong.
But it’s actually right.
So a good hint for any chocolate recipe
is either to add some coffee in
or add some espresso powder to the recipe
and it is amps the flavor up.
So when you’re doing this over heat,
I think it’s nice to just keep stirring.
And anytime you’re doing a double boiler with chocolate,
be gentle.
And you can even take this off heat and keep stirring.
If you feel like it’s getting warm
and then put it back on heat or turn the heat off
and the residual heat will keep things nice and melted.
This looks super thin and watery right now,
but one thing to know about all ganache is the hotter it is,
the thinner the consistency will be.
So you can’t trust and judge based on what you see
when it’s hot.

So here’s the deal.
You didn’t see this happen.
No one uses a whisk for a ganache.
It is not okay.
Don’t do it.
But if you’re making a water ganache,
you might need to get the whisk out just to agitate it more
because there were some chocolate solids
holding together and making it seem grainy.
Now we have a really thin, silky ganache.
And I’m gonna let this cool down
to show you the actual effect.

Finishing & Comparing Ganaches

Back to our cream ganache.
It’s had a time to just melt and look at this.
I love it.
The chocolate is really soft right now.
It just needs to be worked in with the cream.
And cream is the best for making ganache
because it has so much substance and body and fat in there.
It really works with the chocolate super easily.
Stirring this together and one thing I don’t wanna see
are any lumps.
I don’t wanna see those lumps.
This might have cooled down too much.
It’s just a cold day here and this countertop is like ice.
So if that’s the case,
you can either pop this onto a double boiler
or give it a few seconds at half power in the microwave
just to warm it up a little bit and melt it back up.
Even with the lumps in here,
this looks so silky and beautiful
with already starting to set up.
And you can see the gloss.
You can see that nice, wonderful texture it’s gonna have.

If you want a thicker ganache though,
the sculpting method isn’t gonna work
because there’s not enough liquid to melt that chocolate.
Use the double boiler.
You can add the cream and chocolate in together
or you can warm the cream at first,
place it over a simmering water bath
and then just keep stirring over gentle heat.
And if you’re trying to make a white chocolate ganache,
it’s delicious and amazing when it’s done, right?
But you have to use the lowest heat.

One of the most popular and infuriating uses for a ganache
is on a drip cake.
That’s where you finish your cake.
It’s covered in frosting or something
and then you top it with the ganache.
You don’t want it to fall all the way down
because you don’t get that beautiful drip effect.
When you’re doing that,
I have a couple of hints for you.
One, let your ganache cool down.
It’s too hot to use right after it’s melted.
Two, once it’s cooler, get something like a sheet pan,
add some of the ganache on and let it drip over.
See right now, it’s running way too fast.
I know it needs to cool down.
And if it cools down and it’s still too runny,
you’re gonna melt some more chocolate in there.

One of the main problems in making a ganache is breaking.
Breaking is when instead of having a silky smooth mirror glass
finish, you’re having little granules all over the place
and you’re like, oh my gosh, what is this?
It looks horrible.
And the mouth feel is not great either.
You can fix this problem by using butter,
cocoa butter or even like solid coconut oil.
Mix those in, just mix, mix, mix, mix, mix.
And eventually it’ll come and smooth itself out.

My two ganache are starting to set up
and I want to show you the difference
and also the similarity.
Not gonna lie, the water one looked almost like garbage
because it was so thin.
It was just like, almost like coffee
and I was like, oh, maybe it’s not working.
I don’t know what happened.
It’s working, it just takes some time to set up.
I’m gonna show you with a spoon
what the consistency is like, dip it in.
And just like that, you can see it’s really shiny
is giving good coverage.
Now let me show you the water based ganache.
Dip that spoon in there and look at this.
That is gorgeous and it’s even shinier than the cream based one.
So with a water based ganache, the advantages
you can use a dark chocolate and for people
are really sensitive to dairy.
This is for you.
But if you wanted the best flavor,
I gotta say cream is where it’s at.
This chocolate ganache is destined to cover some easy fluffy fudgy chocolate cupcakes I’m making later today.
But for some taking a little bite for you.
That is heaven.
Oh my gosh, it’s like a lot of stuff happens.
It’s so good.
If you like this video, check out my chocolate playlist.