Chocolate mousse is an originally French foamy dessert made of chocolate, cream, or milk, or water, and eggs. Add liquor, lemon zest, almond or raspberry.
Basic recipe for chocolate mousse: 3 large cold eggs, 1 1/2 bar of at least 70% chocolate, 1/2 cup of cream, milk or water, and a pinch of cream of tartar. Makes 4-6 cups. Note that this recipe calls for raw eggs.
-- Chop or break the chocolate in quarter-size pieces. Put the chocolate in a medium mixing bowl, add your liquid of choice, and put the bowl in a pan of simmering water. Melt the chocolate carefully, stirring occasionally. The melted chocolate should look fluid, but not runny. If the mixture is too thick, add more liquid and stir it in.
-- Put the bowl with the chocolate to cool. Add 1-2 tablespoon of liquor, if you like. Cognac, Irish Cream, rum and bitter are possible additions. Don't use the liquor you don't like to drink.
-- Beat three large eggs on high speed until they form pale even foam. It takes 5-10 minutes in a large stand mixer. Add a pinch of cream of tartar. Whole eggs will not form firm peaks like egg whites. If 70% chocolate seems too bitter, add 2-3 tablespoons of sugar while beating eggs.
-- Add 1/6 to 1/4 of the egg foam to chocolate and fold it in. Pour the chocolate in the remaining eggs folding in carefully. Mix from the bottom with an upward motion to make sure no chocolate stays on bottom.
-- Put or pour the mousse in cups. Put the cups in a refrigerator for an hour.
Possible additions: add lemon zest, or almond extract (put sliced almond on top of the cups). Or, fill cups 1/3 with raspberry and pour the mousse on top. My children like it this way, but my husband thinks the mousse gets too runny. Different chocolates go well with different additions.
Cream, milk or water? I like water best. Mousse with water is light and chocolatey. Mousse with cream is smooth, heavy, and soft tasting. A man with a healthy appetite cannot finish such a dessert after a dinner. Milk is a compromise between cream and water. Recently I replaced water with two grated whole Meyer lemons and used 85% chocolate. It was good.
See also: kitchen, dark chocolate, chocolate truffles.