Thursday, November 23, 2006


holiday chocolate edition

devoted readers may recall that last thanksgiving my dh forever banned turkey from the premises, stating his preference for prime 21-day aged porterhouse. well, there it is, there's no use arguing.

most commercial turkey does taste like paper towels, no one can deny; so we're repeating the dinner we had last year, down to the chocolate mousse. well, not the exact same chocolate mousse.

long-time readers know i generally think julia child has the best mousse recipe, not that i follow it. naturally, i add more chocolate.

to my mind what's most important in a chocolate mousse is the ratio of butter to chocolate. that should be 3/4 tablespoon butter for each oz. of chocolate.

so when making this year's mousse with 11 oz. of 72% callebaut, i used 8.25 tablespoons french butter. child's mousse is always better the next day, but for some reason i can never get around to making it the night before.

that doesn't mean you all should follow my bad habit here. i always end up making mine around 11 am on the morning of, which generally works out, until i wake up the next morning, sample the leftovers, and swear i will do it right next year.

dh dislikes espresso in the mousse (why, lawd, why?) so instead i add a good dose of madagascar bourbon vanilla. but of course you can add any flavoring you like: mint, cinnamon, chinese 5 spice powder (dissolve it in the butter when you melt it with the chocolate), fiori di sicilia. . .

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posted by fortune | 1:35 PM | top | link to this | email this: | | | 1 comments