thebigfatnoodle

Boozy chocolate mousse pots

Boozy chocolate mousse (makes 8-10 chocolate pots)

100 grams vanilla sugar (or plain caster sugar and 1 teaspoon of good vanilla essence)

5 egg yolks

Keep 3 of the egg whites for this recipe (either freeze the other 2 egg whites for future use or make an egg white omelette the next day)

1 heaped tablespoon of chocolate powder

150ml of double cream

70 grams of salted or unsalted butter (I personally prefer using salted) – cut into pieces

150 grams of good 70% chocolate (broken into pieces)

3 generous tablespoons of armagnac (or you can replace with rum, cognac or brandy or cointreau – whatever alcohol you like!)

Put 40g of the sugar, all 5 egg yolks, the cocoa powder and the cream together into a bowl. Place the bowl over the simmering saucepan of boiling water (make sure your bowl doesn’t touch the boiling water) and mix until everything’s combined. You want to keep stirring this until the mixture coats the back of the spoon (don’t worry it if looks like not all the cocoa powder’s dissolved because it never dissolves fully whenever I’ve made the mousse).

Turn off the heat and start adding the butter and chocolate pieces, a bit at a time, and keep mixing until everything’s melted and you’ll have beautiful bowl of dark, velvety and glossy chocolate.  At this time, stir in your alcohol of choice!

Leave to the side to cool and in another bowl (make sure this doesn’t have any trace of egg yolk!), beat the egg whites until you form stiff white peaks and start adding the remaining sugar in staggered amounts (a tablespoon at a time) until the egg white mixture is shiny and stiff (like the consistency of a thick  meringue mixture).

Spoon a dollop of the egg white mixture into the chocolate and start folding it in until all the egg white is combined with the chocolate.

ladle the mousse into cups/bowls and leave to set overnight or ideally for 2-3 days before eating.

Creating the sugared topping

Over your set mousse, spoon about 1 teaspoon of demerara or brown sugar over the top and spread the sugar evenly over the top. Fire up a blow torch and burn the sugar until it caramelises and melts evenly. Pop these back into the fridge and then with a spoon, crack open the sugared topping to dive into the chocolate mousse!