All of my Christmas shopping has been done and I just finished my last holiday sweet this evening. Phew! I love giving away pretty containers filled with homemade treats during the holidays and this year’s bounty is pretty impressive. I’ve made a batch of pretty iced Ginger Gems, some white chocolate candy cane bark, plenty of dark chocolate salted mixed nut bark, Orangette’s building blocks (with salted mixed nuts, raisins, candied ginger & dried cranberries) and my yummy fleur de sel caramels. But I felt something was missing so I dug into my bag of tricks and came up with rum balls!
I’m totally new to the world of rum balls…a recent convert so to speak. One afternoon during a long walk on Commercial Drive (a street known for it’s hippies, Italian community and local food spots), Cornelius put me up to a rum ball challenge. We stopped off at 3 different bakeries and tried rum balls at all 3 just so that we could figure out which bakery made the best one. So you better trust that even though I’m new to the rum ball existance, I’m certainly no slacker when it comes to determining what makes a great rum ball. And these, my friends, are great rum balls! A great holiday cookie indeed. Since these are no-bake cookies, the rum flavour doesn’t burn off and they’ve got enough of a kick to keep a smile on your face during whatever holiday stress you encounter.
I don’t have a food processor, so I chopped all the pecans by hand. This works really well for this recipe because a nice nutty texture is best here and you don’t want to end up with a messy paste of finely ground nuts. If you don’t have chocolate cookies, give gingersnaps or vanilla cookies a try!
rum balls
1 1/2 c pecans
1 1/4 c chocolate wafer cookies (or gingersnaps or vanilla cookies)
1/2 c powdered sugar
1/4 t cinnamon
2 T cocoa powder
2 T corn syrup
1/4 c amber rum+ powdered sugar, grated coconut and sweetened cocoa powder
1. Toast the pecans in a 350 degree oven until fragrant (about 10 minutes). Let cool and then chop finely. While pecans are toasting, crush the cookies until fine.
2. In a large bowl, combine crushed pecans, crushed cookies, powdered sugar, cinnamon, and cocoa and stir until well mixed. Add in the rum and corn syrup and mix well. Chill for at least 1 hour.
3. Roll 1 teaspoon of the mixture into balls and roll in your choice of powdered sugar, grated coconut or cocoa powder.
Makes 28 balls…so go ahead and double the recipe!
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wow good job! they kinda look like deluxe timbits :)
Holy fagioli!!
I’m impressed with your sweets-making marathon!
Your rumballs look so pretty and festive and very enticing…
I made your white choco candycane bark and the dark choco salty nuts combo the other day – so effortless and so worth it…apparently they were a big hit with my hubbies colleagues.
Unfortunately, I’ve been forbidden to eat chocolate as it’s been “discovered” to cause me migraines. Woe is me.
Please eat 5 of them for me, okay?
Happy holidays!!
YUM! I wish we had some run on hand!
haha steph! they totally look like timbits!!
happy boozy christmas, aria!!
joanne, sometimes the easist things to make can be the most impressive. glad the bark turned out well and too bad you can’t eat chocolate. now that sucks.
rachel, you could totally make these with bourbon or almond liqueur or almost any booze you have on hand. so easy!!
i always have a boozy christmas so any recipe that can add to that is fine by me. those look awesome and fun to make, yums. hiccup.
I will have to try these for some of the people still on my list. A very merry Christmas to you, J!
these look awesome! the more boozy the better. rum cake is one of my traditions. i’ll have to try rum balls this year. merry x-mas!
merry christmas to you, amy! happy holidays!!
thanks, emerald tiger. i agree that boozy is best ;) happy holidays to you!
Mmm, rum balls…. Those can make any Christmas merry!
Hope you’re enjoying your trip to Victoria!
thanks lisa! victoria was wonderful and so are the rumballs (i had to make a double batch!)
How many gingersnaps? That is missing from your recipe.
Hi Emily, I used 1 1/4 c of gingersnaps instead of chocolate wafers. I'll edit the recipe to reflect that.
mmmm i just made these with amaretto instead of rum, walnuts instead of pecans, and icing sugar instead of powdered sugar (or are they the same thing?)
tried a bit before i put the mix in the fridge and will roll 'em out when i get home from work!
woof. this saved me after a looonnngggg morning.
used molasses instead of corn syrup, which i didn't have, and they were perfecto! and super, super easy.
thanks for the recipe :)