Dark Chocolate Mousse - a Chocolate Lovers Heaven!

If you are a regular visitor of my blog, you would have noticed a chocolate mousse before. It is almost the same recipe, but I slightly modified the ingredients and changed the method of preparation to an easier one. Took some better pics than the previous one and so thought of reposting it. I made this again quite a long back and thought will repost again replacing the old post. It was one of the desserts that I perfected over time. Chocolate mousse is one luxurious dessert of a kind. I first time had chocolate mousse during my college days and loved it. But when I made it at home, I just realized how easy it was to prepare at home and we can even give better flavourings as well. This is a simple and an elegant desert and something that feels real light. There are eggless versions of mousse around, but mine contains raw eggs. Don’t be put off by that. You wont even know that there are eggs in it because it doesn’t give any feel or taste of egg. You won’t even know there are eggs in it until somebody tells you it has! And the chocolate flavour is so strong that it will contradict any egg-y affair. Since the main ingredient calls for chocolate, use the best chocolate you can get hold off.

As you can see, this dessert is a simple one, but if you don’t do it properly, it can affect the texture intensively. Whipping of egg whites is one important factor. When you whip egg whites, you must make sure that the bowl you use for whipping the eggs is grease-free and is squeaky clean. All these will affect the volume of the whipped egg whites. Also make sure that there is no yolk in the egg whites when you separate them. If there is even a teeny bit of yolk in the whites, you can’t whip the whites properly. In this recipe, egg whites are whipped into soft peaks; that is when you lift up the egg whisker after whipping, you should get a wobbly peak at the end of the whisk rather than stiff peaks; something like froth that you get when you shampoo your hair:)(Don’t know if that’s a good example though). This mousse can also be made with milk chocolate, but make sure you reduce the amount of sugar because the chocolate would be sweet already unlike the bittersweet ones.

Other flavours you may try: You may add 1 Tbsp orange rind while scalding the cream to give a subtle orange flavour. I have never tried this, Just because I make all these kind of simple desserts in a jiffy and in hurry and nothing comes in mind at the time. Only when the pudding sets, I would think, Oh! I should have added that and this and so on. But this is one that I am looking forward to try, since orange and chocolate is a heavenly combination. You can also try adding 1 teaspoon of coffee or espresso granules to the hot cream and mix it to give another lovely intense coffee flavour to the mousse.

Before I get in to the recipe, if you are a fan of Malabari cuisine and you are in Toronto, Canada, there is a Malabar restaurant situated in the heart of Toronto, which is one and the only one Malabar restaurant there. You can treat yourself and your loved ones with rich and yummy Malabari food. They also condust an yearly Malabar Food festival where they display an array of Malabar delicasies. Details of their restaurant and more can be found at its homepage Maroli and their blog.

This post goes for 'Thanda Mela' Thanda Mela Event hosted by Srivalli of Cooking 4 all Seasons.

Dark Chocolate mousse:

Serves 6

Ingredients:

150 gm Dark chocolate (72% cocoa)

150 mls double cream

1/3 cup sugar (Taste and add more or less as required)

2 – 3 large eggs, separated (I sometimes add 2 and sometimes 3.)

Preparation:

1. Heat cream in a bowl until scalding point, i.e. until you start seeing the bubbles appearing on surface, but not boil.(I heated it in the microwave)

2. While the cream is being heated, cut the chocolate into small pieces. When the creamhas reached scalding point, add the chocolate pieces. Let it stand for couple of minutes. Stir well until all the chocolate pieces have melted and the mixture is smooth. If at all chocolate din’t melt completely, place the chocolate and cream mixture on a double boiler and heat till all the lumps have melted completely. Alternately you can heat the cream along with the chocoltae in the double boiler or even microwave. If your are doing this way make sure you keep stirring in between and make sure not to burn the chocolate bits.

3. Add sugar and stir well with a spoon until you get a thick glossy mixture.

4. While still warm (but not hot), add the egg yolks and stir well until combined. Keep it aside.

5. In a clean and spotless dish, whip up the egg whites until soft peaks.

6. Add little of the whipped egg whites to the chocolate mixture and fold gently to loosen the mixture.

7. Add the rest of egg whites and gently fold without knocking out the air. (Folding slowly is very important because if you mix it thoroughly, you will knock out all the bubbles in the mousse and ends up in a chocolate cream rather than airy mousse.)

8. Serve in a small individual ramekins or dessert bowls and cover with cling film, if you don’t like the thick film forming on top.

8. For serving: You can whip up some cream and spoon on the mousse and sprinkle cocoa, or add some chocolate shavings sprinkled with icing sugar. Here I stewed few strawberries with some sugar and little corn flour and sprinkled icing sugar.