Custard and Mousse Archives - Page 9 of 11

White Chocolate Panna Cotta with Spiced Red Wine Granita

4|10|2013

I couldn’t wait. Four more months! Just couldn’t!

To express my love for you..

Red hearts were never my thing. I’d rather go for wine.

Words fail me. You’ve been amazing so far.
So I got you wine and chocolate!

I read this somewhere ‘Like fine wine, hangovers get better with age’. Oh dear! And I recently turned a year older!

Happy ~~Valentine’s day~~ Weekend my friends! I really do love you:-)

White Chocolate Panna Cotta with Red Wine Granita
Serves 4

White Chocolate Panna Cotta
1 cup milk
1 cup heavy cream
2 tbsp castor sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence
50g white chocolate coarsely chopped
1 tbsp water
2 tsp powdered gelatine

Red Wine Granita (minimally adapted from Gourmet Traveller magazine)
150 ml red wine
150 ml water
1/3 cup castor sugar
1 cinnamon stick
2 star anise

For the White Chocolate Panna Cotta : Place the heavy cream, milk and sugar in a medium saucepan over medium heat until almost boiling. Remove from heat. Add white chocolate and set aside for 1 minute. Stir until chocolate melts and mixture is smooth. Add the vanilla essence.

Place the 1 tbsp water in a small heatproof bowl. Sprinkle with the gelatine. Place the bowl in a small saucepan. Add enough boiling water to the saucepan to come three-quarters of the way up the side of the bowl. Use a fork to whisk the mixture until the gelatine dissolves. Alternately, add the gelatine to the water and set aside for 5 mins for the gelatine to bloom. Heat for 20 seconds in the microwave and stir to make it smooth.Add the gelatine mixture into the white chocolate mixture. Set aside to cool. Once it cools to room temperature, pour into serving glasses and refrigerate for a minimum 4 hours preferably overnight.

For the Red Wine Granita : Combine all the ingredients in a saucepan over medium heat, bring to a gentle simmer. Stir and cook for 3 minutes, remove from heat and cool completely. Strain and discard solids, pour mixture into a 20cm square shallow tray and freeze, scraping with a fork at hourly intervals to form crystals, until frozen (4-6 hours).

Mocha Mousse with Coffee Glazed Hazelnuts and Cocoa Tuile

5|08|2013

Isn’t it ironical that I am posting about coffee when my morning coffee has just been replaced by a cup of masala chai (spiced tea)! Life has been wonderful. Despite travelling 5000 miles over, I am anything but jet lagged and loving every bit of my break. So have I been missing coffee? Well, not really. I did make sure I had loads of it in my dessert, before I left.

This is the first time I am contributing to the Chocolate Party hosted by Roxana’s Home Baking and I couldn’t be more excited. Chocolate is one word that is probably scribbled all over my blog and has the most number of recipes dedicated to it. When I learnt the secret ingredient for August was coffee, I didn’t want to miss it though I knew it would be a little early on a vacation to open my laptop and think ‘blog’. So I prepared my dessert and photographed it well ahead in time.

I love this pairing! Needless to say it’s a decadent, rich mousse, heady with the triple dose of coffee. If you love coffee, this is the dessert for you. To make it totally coffee-ish I glazed the hazelnuts (along with a few cashew nuts) with a bitter-sweet coating of coffee and baked them to crispness. One spoonful of this and it takes all your willpower to stop. The tuile makes the dessert look stunning though you can leave it out if you think it’s a hassle. I added it because I wanted to give equal weightage to both the ingredients.

Mocha Mousse with Coffee Glazed Hazelnuts and Cocoa Tuile
Serves 4

Mocha Mousse

½ Cup heavy cream for the custard (Crème Anglaise)
1 tsp instant coffee powder
4 Egg Yolks
¼ Cup Sugar(or to taste)
3/4 cup Dark Chocolate, chopped
1/2 Cup Heavy Cream for whipping

1 Tablespoon Coffee Liquor, optional (I used Kahlua)

Heat the ½ cup cream over medium heat in a saucepan. Add the instant coffee powder and stir to dissolve. Beat the egg yolks and sugar together in a bowl. When the cream reaches boiling point take it off the heat, add 2 tsp of the coffee cream mixture into the egg mixture and whisk. Gradually pour the remaining cream over the egg mixture whisking constantly till combined. (This is done gradually so as to ensure that the eggs don’t scramble) Return the egg-cream mixture to the pan.

Heat the mixture under a medium-low flame, whisking constantly till the mixture thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon. This is called a Creme anglaise/custard.

Place the dark chocolate in a bowl. Remove the custard from heat and pass it through a sieve into the bowl of chocolate. Let the mixture remain undisturbed for a while. Stir to smoothen out the chocolate. Cool to room temperature. While the custard is cooling, whip the remaining 1/2 cup cream to stiff peaks. Add the coffee liquor if using and stir slowly to combine. Store in the refrigerator till needed.

When the chocolate mixture has cooled down completely add it to the whipped cream little at a time & fold in till no white streaks appear. Pour into serving glasses. Refrigerate till set, about 4 hours or preferably overnight.

Coffee Glazed Hazelnuts

1 tbsp water
1/2 tsp instant coffee powder
2 tbsp castor sugar
1 tbsp golden syrup or light corn syrup
1 cup hazelnuts

Preheat oven to 180 degree C. Line a baking tray with aluminium foil.
Add all the ingredients except the hazelnuts to a medium saucepan and place over medium heat. Bring to a boil stirring constantly till the mixture has blended completely and looks dark brown. Remove from heat and add in the nuts and mix till evenly coated. Spread on the baking tray in a single layer. Bake for 10 minutes, stirring once in between. Remove from the oven and cool completely. Break into pieces and store till needed.

Cocoa Tuile

20 g all-purpose flour
20 g butter, room temperature
20 ml water
20 g cocoa powder
70 g icing sugar

Preheat oven to 180 degree C. Line a baking tray with baking paper.
Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl till a smooth paste forms. Spread evenly in a thin layer on the baking sheet. Bake for 10 minutes or until the edges turn golden brown. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for about a minute. Break into desired shapes and let harden for about 2 mins.

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No Bake Oreo Cheesecake Strawberry Mousse Duo

27|07|2013

If you have been with me for a while now, you would know how much I like dressing up my desserts. Layers, swirls, drizzles, sprinkles…I can go on adding elements as long as they balance each other out. It’s like my favourite playtime fun as a little girl…dressing up my dolls in pink,with lace and frills, matching hairclips and shoes and so. I come up with ideas and love watching it all come together. Some turn out as I visualised, some don’t but there’s always a learning somewhere.

Till about a couple of years ago my desserts would never go below 4 layers. I had the time and the patience. It’s a different situation now with two little heads constantly peeping into the refrigerator and wanting to know when they can eat. The refrigerator door is opened and re-opened at frequent intervals. The reason.. ‘ I’m checking if it has set’. I am loving the latest additions to the vocabulary. However, the more important reason is that I have ‘borrowed’ Oreo cookies for my dessert. So you understand, everybody has an equal claim to it.

This is a big dessert but not really heavy. The cheesecake is on the richer side on account of the cream cheese so I decided to go with a lighter mousse. I have not used my usual egg-cream mousse recipe here, though personally I prefer that one. You can easily leave out the top layer and serve it with some fresh strawberries instead. Oreos are great even when they are crushed and they add a lovely texture to the cheesecake. The different layers can be made simultaneously and refrigerated to be assembled later or they can be made as and when the layer below is setting.

No Bake Oreo Cheesecake Strawberry Mousse Duo
Yields 4

For the Oreo crust
150 g Oreo biscuits, divided (half to be used for the crust and half for the cheesecake)
40 g butter, melted

For the cheesecake
200 g cream cheese, room temperature
2 tbsp castor sugar
1/2 cup heavy/whipping cream, whipped to soft peaks
1 tsp powdered gelatine
1 tbsp warm water

For the strawberry mousse
1 cup strawberries, hulled and chopped
3 tbsp castor sugar
1 tsp powdered gelatine
1 tbsp warm water
1 cup whipping cream, whipped to soft peaks
2 drops pink food colouring

Process biscuits until they resemble fine breadcrumbs. Remove half the mixture and keep aside. To the remaining half, add the melted butter and process to combine. Place 3 ring moulds on a baking tray. Divide the mixture between the ring moulds and press against the base and edge to form the crust. Refrigerate for 30 mins or until firm

Meanwhile, make the Oreo cheesecake. Soak the gelatine in warm water and microwave for 10 seconds for it to dissolve completely. With an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese and sugar until smooth. Fold in the cream and the biscuit crumbs. Add the gelatine and mix to combine. Pour the mixture into the ring moulds on top of the crust till half filled. Refrigerate for 3 hours or until set. Reserve (refrigerate) the rest for top layer to pipe onto the strawberry mousse.

For the strawberry mousse, process strawberries and sugar to a smooth pulp. Strain and keep aside. Dissolve gelatine in warm water and microwave fo 10 seconds to dissolve completely. Cool and add to strawberry pulp. Fold the strawberry pulp slowly into the whipped cream. Add 2 drops of food coloring and mix well till colour is uniform. Pour over the chilled Oreo cheesecake. Refrigerate till set, about 3-4 hours.

To serve: Release the dessert by gently lifting the ring moulds and applying gentle pressure from below. Fill up a piping bag with the reserved Oreo cheesecake. Pipe onto the strawberry mousse and decorate with sprinkles. Refrigerate till set.

Note: If you do not have ring moulds or mousse rings at home, you can layer the dessert in serving glasses.

Irish Cream Milk Chocolate Mousse

24|06|2013

It poured incessantly all weekend. Rains are great but not when it is already cold. And definitely not during the weekend. When I woke up to the rains on Saturday morning, I imagined how our weekend would turn out, walled in with no adventure. But to lift up the spirits, the Husband served a gourmet breakfast, all plated up with the perfect amount of cheese. Loads of it! Now that was not a bad start.

It did not shower in a huge downpour…just an annoying drizzle that wouldn’t go away. We came up with the idea of an impromptu visit to our earlier suburb. The twins instantly recognised the place, much to my surprise and became very excited. And so was I. That familiar lanes, shops, faces, library, parks and the BAKEWARE store. I realised how much I missed this place. We had a Vietnamese lunch at our usual table at the restaurant and talked about memories of our stay in that locality. I had stayed a considerable amount of time with the kids alone there on account of my husband’s work related travel but I was almost always at ease. Guess who I had for a neighbour. The cops!

During the course of the conversation, I was reminded of this dessert that I had made for myself at midnight during one such long travel. I made four servings, added a good deal of liquor (far more than the recipe), refrigerated them for setting up, piped a little decoration the first thing I woke up in the morning, took pictures, posted them on Facebook (for my husband to see:-)). And devoured them myself! It definitely made me feel good…and a little less lonely. Bailey’s Irish cream, I think can by default takes you to Heaven. When you add chocolate to it…need I say more!! Have you ever made something fancy, just for yourself? I would love to hear your stories.

Until this day, one of the pictures was the profile photograph of my blog’s Facebook page. But l missed posting this beauty. When I came back home, I looked up some old folders and found what I was looking for. And a lot more. So many posts that never happened. Or should I say, yet to happen.

The forecast is calling for rains all week. But guess who’s not disheartened.

Rains are great!!

Irish Cream Milk Chocolate Mousse
Serves 4

4 Egg Yolks
¼ Cup Sugar(or to taste)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ Cup heavy cream for the custard (Crème Anglaise)
3/4 Cup Milk Chocolate chopped or broken into cubes
1 teaspoon powdered gelatine
1 Cup Heavy Cream for whipping

2 Tablespoons Irish Cream (preferably Baileys)

Heat the ½ cup cream over medium heat in a saucepan. Beat the egg yolks and sugar together in a bowl. When the cream reaches boiling point take it off the heat, let it cool till just warm and add the gelatine. Let the mixture stand till the gelatine becomes puffy. Reheat the cream slightly till gelatine dissolves and slowly pour it over the egg mixture whisking constantly. Return the egg-cream mixture to the pan.

Heat the mixture under a medium-low flame, whisking constantly till the mixture thickens enough to coat the back of a spoon. This is called a Creme anglaise/custard.

Place the milk chocolate in a bowl. Remove the custard from heat and pass it through a sieve into the bowl of chocolate. Let the mixture remain undisturbed for a while. Stir to smoothen out the chocolate. Cool to room temperature.

While the custard is cooling, whip the remaining 1 cup cream to stiff peaks. Add the 2 tablespoons of Irish cream and mix gently. Store in the refrigerator till needed.

When the chocolate mixture has cooled down completely add it to the whipped cream gradually & fold in till no white streaks appear. Pour into serving glasses. Refrigerate till set, about 4 hours or preferably overnight.

To serve, pipe a little swirl of whipped cream or simply dust with cocoa powder.