Thin carbonaceous shells were synthesized around silver nanoparticles (Ag NP). Ag NP's were grown by reduction of silver oxide in water with hydrogen gas. The shell was synthesized from fructose by a hydrothermal dewatering process in a glass pressure tube. The total size of the NP's can be readily controlled between 10 – 150 nm by varying the size of the core and shell. The carbonaceous shells are porous allowing molecules that have affinity to the metal to adsorb on Ag surface. At the same time, the shell serves as a protection layer limiting particle aggregation. The effect of the shell thickness on the plasmon resonance of Ag cores was also investigated.