ADVENTURES IN DOMESTICITY: Meeshie Mousse Edition

Two weeks ago, my dear friend Meeshie paid me a visit here in Los Angeles and volunteered to whip me up a batch of chocolate mousse. There was one condition though: I had to post it on the blog. Not a problem for me. A simple blog post in exchange for free mousse? Sign me up!

After the jump, check out Meeshie’s homemade mousse…

Promisingly enough, Meeshie starts off by making me fetch a bottle of brandy from my bar. I like where this is headed.

Meeshie melts some unsweetened Baker’s chocolate and Hershey’s milk chocolate. She spurns the traditional bowl-over-a-water-bath method for the more daring direct-heat approach. It’s very alarming.

Meeshie attacks the chocolate with a wooden spoon.

Early signs of meltage.

Further softening.

Okay, we could have stopped the mousse process right here, and I would have been just as happy.

I just want to stare at melting chocolate.

Almost there…

Checking in on some raisins macerating in rum. It’s not for this recipe. Stay tuned…

Chocolate is ready, dreamy.

Now the healthy stuff: lots o’ cream.

I don’t remember how much this is, but it’s definitely more than my mother would approve of.

Time to commence the beating portion of the recipe.

Meeshie goes to town.

Soon we have a very respectable whipped cream.

Now one of my least favorite activities: separating eggs.

Meeshie does a good job, but there are a few close calls that have me on the edge of my seat. Very exciting stuff here.

Time to beat the whites.

Stiff peaks ensue. I think Meeshie also adds sugar into the whites, but I really don’t remember. She can fill you all in in the comments section.

Lastly, time to beat the yolk (sort of sounds like a ’90s dance fad).

Commence Phase III: folding.

Well, this is pre-fold.

Mid-folding, Meeshie adds the brandy.

The eggs are more or less folded.

Time to fold the chocolate.

Starting to salivate.

Things get RILL messy RILL quickly.

Meeshie requests instant coffee crystals (for a real depth of flavor, as Ina says, but I have none). From the looks of it, I think we’ll be just fine.

Last folding item: the whipped cream.

Meeshie is folding so much, I’m tempted to call her Foldilocks. But I don’t.

Finally, the mousse is more or less done.

Next step: into the fridge for a few hours to set up.

When the mousse is ready, Meeshie scoops some into a martini glass. We FANCY. Meeshie has also made Kahlua whipped cream in the interim (the Kahlua to make up for the lack of instant coffee) and adds a dollop to the mousse. At last, it’s time to enjoy…

Yum! It’s hard to go wrong with chocolate, especially chocolate mousse. I enjoyed this quite a bit. Meeshie expressed concerns that this wasn’t her best batch. We weren’t really sure what the problem could have been, but maybe the lack of coffee left this dessert without the aforementioned real depth of flavor. Who knows. I definitely snuck many servings of it over the following days.

Thanks Meeshie!