I have recently made two different chocolate cakes. These two different chocolate cakes combine additional flavours such as cinnamon, apple, or plum, chestnut. Interestingly both have dark rum.
One is a rich dense flourless chocolate cake with flavours of chestnuts and prunes and dark rum, the other one is a light chocolate mousse cinnamon, apple and dark rum dessert.
Gateau Mozart
This is a recipe from Pierre Hermé “Le Larousse du Chocolat“. Pierre Hermé is a famous french pastry chef, most famous for his macarons. His cookbook Le Larousse du Chocolat gathers good chocolate recipes across France and some of Pierre Hermé as well.
I had not done the Gateau Mozart for some time (recipe HERE). Imagine three very thin disks of sweet shortcrust pastry with a subtle cinnamon flavour alternating with a light chocolate mousse which contains apples cooked in butter, a pinch of cinnamon and have been flambé !
Flourless chestnut, chocolate and rum cake
I found this recipe a while ago in the Delicious Magazine. I had cut out the recipe and placed in my cookbooks. This recipe intrigued me because of the combination of chestnut and prune and rum. With chestnut puree, you retain a lot of moisture and the flavour is undeniable. Years ago, I made up a chestnut steamed pudding. It is such a nice dessert. My curiosity was picked.
You did read properly “Chocolate Mousses” with a “s” at the end. Yeah!!!
This means we get to speak about a few versions of this hero dish. There is no single recipe for chocolate mousse, the recipe to use depends on the application: is it to be served on its own? or is it to use as a layer in a cake?
I have also ventured into the word of raw and vegan people by trying the raw chocolate mousse in which avocados are used to create the body of the mousse. I even tried the water chocolate mousse from Heston Blumenthal, which was a lot of fun!
The classic French Chocolate Mousse
Use: dessert in individual portions or in a large bowl to share.
Ingredients: good dark chocolate and eggs ONLY (no sugar, no cream).
Accessibility: super easy to make and always a winner. Needs to be done in advance
I love this one, for me it is “the chocolate mousse”. Mum used to make a large bowl of it for the family and guests.
Use: in proper cooking, it is used as part of a layered cake but you will find it as a stand alone recipe if you google chocolate mousse in Australia (and probably most anglophone countries). When I am served such a mousse in a cafe or restaurant, it is for me a massive let down (and I won’t eat it, not a fan) and generally says much of the restaurant. However, in a layered cake, where it is associated with some more complex flavours, these mousse has its place.
Ingredients: cream whipped and mixed with chocolate powder, cocoa and sugar or at best cooking chocolate.
Accessibility: super easy. Should be done earlier.
The mixed version
I happen to make recently (not for the first time) a mousse which we really like. It is quite strong and is often served with some fruity notes and a crunchy element. This mousse is decadent! It is yummy and you must stop yourself to avoid cleaning off the bowl!
Use: As an element of a dessert. Likened to little chocolate pots desserts. The texture is silky and shiny!
Accessibility: super easy. Can be eaten straight away.
I tried the avocado chocolate mousse in order to know what it is all about. I purchased some raw cacao and was lucky enough to do my grocery when there was a special on avocados!
The concept is very simple: put the avocado flesh in the food processor with some raw cocoa and some liquid sweetener and whizz! You can add a little drop of water to reach the desired consistency.
I tried three versions of it:
raw cacao
dutch cocoa
good dark chocolate
The recipe is HERE. I pushed it and made some raw tarts (see photo).
Result: the fruity flavours of the cocoa, or maybe the avocado are really the novelty for me. If you don’t use enough cocoa, the avocado taste comes through which is not great. All together, it has a very earthy smell and flavour which is not for everybody. As for the tarts, the texture is very crumbly (just nuts, oil and sweetener), which is no surprise as there are no binder. Both the avo mousse and tarts were not a success in our household.
The Water chocolate mousse (Heston Blumenthal)
I had to try it. I saw it on television and just the idea of it grasped my curiosity.
The method is easy, you bring to the boil the water and pour it over your chocolate previously chopped in small pieces. Now start whisking and don’t stop! The whisking will integrate air bubbles while the temperature decreases. Eventually it reaches a crystallisation point. That point is reached all of a sudden. You get some warning as you see and feel the mix thicken, just then, it sets, if you go to far (like I did the first time) you get like a dirt texture which can actually be great for some specific desserts set up.
start whisking
Inserting bubbles
Done!
Water chocolate mousse. It hardens the minute is is made, to serve immediately.
Tips:
If you went too far, you can reheat the mousse a little , it will liquefy again, Start whisking again!
You can use a large bowl of ice to bring the temperature down quicker but remove it as soon as the mix starts to change a bit
The mix will be very liquid at first, then will become like cream, then thickened cream. Stop there.
Recipe and video HERE. Feel free to reduce the proportions, I used half of that.
This chocolate mousse is “mmm’, how to tell you: worth a trip to the fridge in the middle of the night, melty, luxious, tasty, addictive, …you get it?
On its own it is quite strong , served with a little nut crumble and fruit mix, it is perfect!
The recipe is very close to the French recipe for little pots of chocolate cream. I intend to serve it like this next time I make it.
It contains both eggs and cream and of course good quality chocolate. The recipe is extracted and adapted from Simply the Best by Valli Little.
Ingredients
55 g caster sugar
2 tbs brandy or liquor of your choice (omit if you want)
125 mL of water (1/2 cup)
200 g dark chocolate
3 eggwhites
185 mL (3/4 cup) thickened cream
Method
Break the chocolate in pieces and place in the food processor, blend into small pieces.
In a small saucepan, heat up the sugar, water and brandy to boiling.
With the blender’s motor running, add the hot liquid to the chocolate and blend until all melted and combined. Stop the blender.
Add at the same time the cream and egg whites. Blend 10 to 15 seconds (max) until just combined. Here you have to trust the recipe as it is so counter-intuitive for a mousse, but trust me it works. If you blend for too long (I did it once), your cream will not set properly.
Pour into a container, cover or close the container and refrigerate for at least 4 hours or overnight.
To serve, warm up spoon with hot water, with the spoon, make a quenelle and place it on a plate.
Ideas for serving:
Instead of placing the cream in one container, divide it in small individual ramequins (small bowls). Serve with a dry biscuits.
This is a great dessert that can be done early and only requires last minute plating. The mousse is shiny and just exquisite!
Serves 6
All the ingredients can be prepared in advance and stored separately.
For the chocolate mousse
Ingredients
55 g caster sugar
2 tbs brandy or liquor of your choice (omit if you want)
125 mL of water (1/2 cup)
200 g dark chocolate
3 eggwhites
185 mL (3/4 cup) thickened cream
Method
Break the chocolate in pieces and place in the food processor, blend into small pieces.
In a small saucepan, heat up the sugar, water and brandy to boiling.
With the blender’s motor running, add the hot liquid to the chocolate and blend until all melted and combined. Stop the blender.
Add at the same time the cream and egg whites. Blend 10 to 15 seconds (max) until just combined. Here you have to trust the recipe as it is so counter-intuitive for a mousse, but trust me it works. If you blend for too long (I did it once), your cream will not set properly.
Pour into a container, cover or close the container and refrigerate for at least 4 hours or overnight.
For the nut crumble
Ingredients:
10 macadamia raw
1 tbsp of brown soft sugar
2 tbsp of plain flour
15 g of soft butter
Method:
Place all the ingredients in a small food processor. Process until crumbly.
Place on a sheet of baking paper on a baking tray
Insert into the oven at 160°C, toast until golden
For the raspberry coulis
Ingredients:
3/4 cup of frozen raspberries
1/4 cup icing sugar
2 tbsp water
Method:
Blend the raspberries, water and sugar until smooth. Adjust the sweetness with more sugar if needed. I prefer not to add much sugar as there will already be some in the nut crumble and chocolate mousse.
To Serve
Use a warm spoon to scoop a clean quenelle of chocolate mousse, place the nut crumble soil, then the coulis.
The avocado chocolate mousse is often loved from vegan people or adept of the raw diet. Most of the recipes use raw cacao powder. This is where it gets confusing for the majority of us. See below for definitions.
A few definitions
In English language the words cacao and cocoa refer to two different products. Just reminding you here that in most Latin languages, the translation for “cocoa” is “cacao”!
Here are the adopted definitions (not by me, by all):
English Word
French word
Definition
Definition (francais)
Cacao
Cacao cru
Powder made from the bean of the cacao pod. The beans have not been roasted.
Cacao cru ou «non torréfié», la poudre resulte du broyage des feves de cacao (pas de fermentation, et torrefaction).
Cocoa
Cacao
Powder resulting from grinding cacao beans which have been roasted. Light brown colour. In Australia, this is the most used form of cocoa powder. In France and possibly some parts of Canada, dutch cocoa is mostly used.
Poudre de cacao naturel ayant subi les procedes de fermentation et torrefaction. De couleur brun pâle. Ce cacao est plus acide et amère que la poudre de cacao alcalinisé. Son goût est par contre plus fruité. C'est la forme principalement utilise en recettes dans les pays anglophones.
Dutch cocoa (e.g. VanHouten, Blooker, Fry's)
Cacao hollandais ou cacao alcalinise
cocoa beans that have been washed with a potassium carbonate solution, to alkalise the pH and to neutralise their acidity. The powder is dark brown in colour.
Poudre de cacao naturel qui a subi une alcalinisation. Le cacao est moins acide et sa couleur plus foncee. En France, c'est le cacao le plus utilise dans les recettes.
Got it?
Ingredients:
2 large ripe avocados
1/2 cup of maple syrup
1 tsp of vanilla extract
1/2 cup of raw cacao
Note: if you prefer using a good quality chocolate, you will need close to 200 g, melted. You will end up with a higher volume of mousse. Note that couverture chocolate will harden, better stick to the 70% Nestle supermarket version. In that case, remove the maple syrup.
Method:
Place everything in the food processor and blend on high speed until processed and smooth. If you think the mousse is too thick, add a little water at the time.
Place in individual ramequins and refrigerate until use.
Note: this mousse can also be used to fill raw chocolate mousse tarts
Raw chocolate mousses, left one using a dark cooking chocolate, right one using cocoa powder (the one using raw cacao is not pictured here, it is similar to the right one, maybe a bit lighter in colour).
A real chocolate mousse is light and airy. The chocolate mousse is made only from eggs and good quality cooking chocolate. There is no sugar, no cream! Chocolate mousses for cakes are different and would include whipped cream. You will find this recipe with small variations on pretty much every French chef website.
Make it at least 4 hours before serving as it needs to set in the fridge. You can make it the day before if you want. You can put the mousse in individual ramequins or serve it as one dish to share.
200 g dark cooking chocolate (I like to use 70% but it may be a bit strong for children, use as a minimum a 50%+ chocolate)
6 large eggs separated
10 cl milk (preferred) or water
Method
Melt the chocolate with the method of your choice. For non-couverture chocolate, I would typically break the tablet in chunks in a bowl, add the milk or water and microwave for 2 minutes on 50 or 70% power depending on the strength of your microwave. It is important that the chocolate does not burn. Once melted, mix until silky smooth. If using couverture chocolate you will want to melt it in a bain Marie (once melted add the milk) and ensure your eggs are at room temperature. The role of the milk is to make it easier to mix in the egg whites.
Add one egg yolk at the time and mix well.
Beat the egg whites to snow quite firm and insert them by folding them into the chocolate slowly.
Transfer to a bowl or individual ramequins, cover with cell wrap and place in the fridge. The mousse will settle in the fridge.
Remove from the fridge 20-30 min before serving (in summer 10 min is enough), serve with a madeleine or other plain biscuit.
Gateau Mozart (Pierre Herme) is a cake for celebration days!
The Gateau Mozart is a Pierre Hermé’s chocolate mousse cake combining chocolate, a subtle cinnamon flavour and cooked apples (in butter!). This recipe is part of Le Larousse du Chocolat. The cake consists of three thin and very friable disks of sweet cinnamon shortcrust pastry with layers of chocolate mousse and cooked apples. The recipe is rather easy, the difficulty is in making the thin circles without breaking them.
In my version, I wanted a cake higher than 4 centimetres, so I doubled the quantity for the mousse and apples (here I am giving the original recipe). I find that that the dough pastry makes 4 circles rather than 3 (one spare one just in case)!
Serves 6-8.
Sweet shortcrust cinnamon pastry
180 g butter, at room temperature and diced
40 g icing sugar
35 g almond meal
8 g ground cinnamon
2 hard-boiled egg yolks, thinly passed through a sieve
1 cl dark rum
Pinch of salt (except if using salted butter)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder (1/2 sachet)
200 g flour
In a bowl place the butter and work it with a spatula, add the icing sugar, the almond meal, ground cinnamon, salt, flour, egg yolks, baking powder and rum. Do not work the dough too much, it is very friable.
Rest for 4 hours cell-wrapped in the fridge.
Roll the dough between 2 sheets of baking paper to 2 mm thick and make 4 disks of 21 cm diameter. Watch out for creases. Place the disks flat in the fridge for half an hour. You may want to take only 1/3 of the dough each time and do one disk at the time. I find that 4 disks can be made.
In the meanwhile, preheat the oven at 180ºC.
Bake each disk for 18-20 minutes then cool down on a cooling rack (bake each disk on the baking paper you rolled it on).
Apple chocolate mousse
100 g Granny Smith apples – I like to double almost double the quantity of apple.
10 g butter
1 g cinnamon
35 g caster sugar
6 cl cream
2 cl of dark rum
1 small cinnamon stick broken
165 g dark chocolate 70% cocoa
120 g egg white
Peel the apples and cut in cubes. Cook in a fry-pan for 3-4 minutes with the butter, 10 g of the sugar and the cinnamon powder.
Add the rum and flambe.
Set aside to cool to room temperature
Bring to the boil the cream with the cinnamon stick, filter. Melt the chocolate in a bain-marie. Mix the cinnamon cream and chocolate together to obtain a ganache.
Beat the whites to snow with the remaining 25 g sugar, incorporate 1/3 to the chocolate, then the rest folding gently, add the apples and fold again gently.
Assemblage
Place one disk at the bottom of a 21 cm springform tin, cover with half of the mousse, now, gently add a second disk, cover with the remaining mousse. Place the third disk.
Refrigerate for a minimum of 30-45 minutes.
Run a knife between the wall of the tin and the cake. Remove the outer circle and base and slide on the serving plate.
You can now decorate the side with broken chocolate curls (or large pieces grated chocolate), you can also decorate the top with a little cocoa powder, cinnamon sticks and sliced apples.
I happen to make recently (not for the first time) a mousse which we really like. It is quite strong and is often served with some fruity notes and a crunchy element. This mousse is decadent! It is yummy and you must stop yourself to avoid cleaning off the bowl!
