Chocolate Mousse with Orange Mascarpone/#Happy-ness.

I'm a girl of my word. I said the next post on the blog would have chocolate in it.

What I forgot to sort of-kind of mention is that it'd have almost ONLY chocolate in it. The simplicity of the recipe is directly proportional to the taste. If I could do the blasphemy thing, I'd say it was Heaven in a Cup. It's even better than ganache. As if such a thing could be humanly possible.

Chocolate mousse is the recipe du jour. Don't just dismiss it as a fancy-80s-aunty dessert. Most of the time, I decide it's not worth all the expense and effort to make mousse or souffle of any sort. Separating egg yolks from the whites? Won't (and more importantly can't) do it. Gelatin clumping and smelling like melted plastic? Exasperating. Whipping cream being over beaten and turning into butter? Depressing, even if the buttery mix ends up in my tummy (inside and out), any way.

So when the Father of Molecular Gastronomy puts an exquisite mousse recipe up, I'd run away screaming bloody murder, right? Wrong.

Heston Blumenthal is the guest on Masterchef who reduces everybody to tears ("Oh my God, I can't believe I met Heston Blumenthal; I'm going to remember this all my life; Best day of my life" et cetera.) The contestants look at him, and their knees turn to jelly (passion fruit or persimmon or similar fancy flavours, I'm guessing). I'd imagine it'd be like a microbiologist meeting Louis Pasteur. His recipes take hours and hours to craft.

Not this one. This is easy, but "deelishus", nevertheless. It panders to the little geek in me, the one who had the Junior Chemistry Kit at the age of seven.

Accompanying the chocolate mousse, I made an Orange Mascarpone. Chocolate and orange are one of those grown-up flavours I'm really starting to enjoy. Mascarpone isn't available in Madras, so I made my own. Feel free to serve the mousse with some fresh cream whipped with orange zest and powdered sugar. If you're hell-bent on the mascarpone, I'll tell how to make your own!

The only thing I'm going to insist you do, is that you use good-quality dark chocolate.

Bring out the Ghiardelli, Callebaut, Valrohna, Lindt and Godiva!

It's absolutely crucial that you love the chocolate you're using, because it's going to smack-bang! taste of it, times ten. Any decent dessert-bar Chocolate Mousse is going to cost you way more, anyway.

Heston Blumenthal's Chocolate Mousse with Orange Mascarpone cream:

Ingredients:

For the chocolate mousse:

Dark chocolate- 140 grams
Water- 1/2 cup (115 ml)
Espresso (or instant coffee) - 2 tsps
Granulated sugar - 2 tablespoons (optional)

For the orange mascarpone:

Mascarpone cheese-125 grams
Powdered sugar-2 tablespoons.
Zest of one orange.

Method:

For the chocolate mousse:

Fill a big, heat-proof bowl halfway with ice and cold water. Keep aside.

In a thick-bottomed pan, over medium heat, add the espresso powder to the water. Bring to a boil.

Turn the heat down to low/Sim. Add the chocolate into the coffee.

Stir occasionally until you get a homogeneous, smooth chocolate mixture.

Transfer the bowl into the prepared ice water-bath. Make sure none of the water gets into the mousse.

Beat the chocolate with a hand mixer or a whisk until stiff peaks form.

If the chocolate turns grainy or gloopy, re-heat it until it melts and shock over the ice-water again.

Spoon the mousse into cups.

Refrigerate, covered, for 3 hours or so.

That's the texture you're looking for.

For the orange mascarpone:

Beat all the ingredients until soft peaks form. Do not over-beat.

 Spoon some mascarpone over the mousse or by the side of the mousse and serve immediately.

Easy as that. No wandwork or N.E.W.T-level spells required. This recipe is a bit of a reputation-killer, honestly. I'm sure nobody thinks I'm a cook of any repute after seeing the simplicity behind what I've made. But you'll thank me once you make it..

Hello, my darling.

And eat it. Mmm!