This recipe comes from the little book of chocolate recipes written by Joanne Harris and Fran Warde, called “The little book of Chocolat”. It’s a lovely book, full of very well written and doable recipes, each one styled on a character in the novel “Chocolat”.
I have made chocolate mousse before, several times and with great success. This one is different because it contains espresso coffee, thereby making it “mocha” and a layer of crushed amaretti biscuits. As it was just after Easter, I adorned it with some micro chocolate eggs for decoration and, of course, added crunch and chocolate.
It was very easy to make and, as it needs to be well chilled before serving (a bit like me before dinner), I made it well in advance. The wonderful thing is that not only was it excellent, the crushed biscuits still being crisp and crunchy after several hours in the fridge, but it was still excellent two days later.
It makes six portions and there were five of us for dinner so one portion languished in the fridge for a full two days before we remembered it was there. The biscuits were still crunchy, the little chocolate eggs had not sunk. That tells me that it’s a very useful recipe indeed. Maybe two days before serving is pushing it a bit but I would not hesitate to make this the day before a dinner party, knowing with confidence that it will still be delicious.
The serving glasses are my charity shop find from around Christmas which I am very pleased with. The very small glass plates are from a stack of no less than twelve that I spotted on a table at a vide grenier (brocante) at Angles-sur-l’Anglin last month. At five euros for the lot they are most definitely a bargain. Especially as I have since remembered where I saw them for sale in a shop and for 1.50 euros each!
Ingredients
100ml double cream
4 tblsp freshly made espresso coffee
200g dark chocolate, grated (using a food processor grating disc makes this part a lot easier and quicker than by hand)
4 eggs, separated
100g amaretti biscuits (*70g is probably enough for six servings)
Method
Gently warm the cream in a medium saucepan, remove from the heat and add the espresso and chocolate. Stir until all the chocolate has melted and is well blended.
Whisk the egg yolks and add to the chocolate, stirring until blended in.
Whisk the egg whites to stiff peaks. Mix about half into the chocolate mixture then fold in the rest.
Put the amaretti biscuits into a plastic bag and bash with a rolling pin until crushed to small crumbs.
Fill six serving glasses about half way with the mousse and add a layer of amaretti crumbs. Make sure you reserve some crumbs to decorate the top of each mousse. Divide the rest of the mousse between the six glasses, filling carefully so as not to disturb the layer of crumbs. Dust the tops with the remaining amaretti crumbs and add other decorations if you like.
Chill for at least two hours before serving. Can be made well in advance.
Serves 6.
Now that's obviously seriously delicious but it's also very useful when you need something made in advance (and I usually do). I'm still jealous of those glasses.
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