ScarlettFrozen Mocha Mousse Tart with Chocolate Curls
May 31st 2007 10:00
Frozen Mocha Mousse Tart with Chocolate Curls
About Mousse
Mousse is a form of creamy dessert typically made from egg and cream usually with other flavour such as chocolate or fruit. The ingredients are beaten separately and then folded together carefully to produce a light and fluffy yet extremely rich confection. It is then chilled to maintain the fluffiness.
Once only a speciality of French restaurants, chocolate mousse entered into American and English home cuisine in the 1960s. Mousse-like desserts in Middle America commonly go under designations like “whip”.
Depending on how it is prepared, it can range from light and fluffy to creamy and thick.
About Café Mocha
Café Mocha is a variant of a café latte. Like a latte it is typically one third espresso and two thirds steamed milk, but a shot of chocolate is added. Typically the chocolate is in the form of an Italian syrup, although less sophisticated vending systems use instant chocolate powder. Whipped cream, dustings of cocoa and marshmallows may also be added on top for flavour and decoration.
This being an American invention, it is mostly unknown in Italy and other continental European countries. Mocha was originally a particular variety of coffee from Mocha, Yemen, made without cocoa, but which tasted as if it had cocoa in it, and modern usage usually refers to an imitation of it using other coffee varieties and cocoa.
A term moccaccino is used in some regions of Europe and the Middle East to describe Café Latte with cocoa or chocolate.
About Pâte Brisée
This is a flavourful pastry dough that is quick to make and easy to roll out. The pastry can be made in a food processor, electric mixer, or by hand. Just make sure the butter and water are cold and don’t over mix this dough or it will be tough after baking. Pâte brisée is pronounced path bree-ZAY. It is a French short crust pastry dough made from a mixture of flour, a little sugar, salt, butter, and ice water. It has a high ratio of fat to flour which gives the pastry its crumbly texture and buttery flavour. Used in both sweet and savory pastries.
About Espresso
Espresso is a concentrated coffee beverage brewed by forcing very hot, but not boiling, water under high pressure through coffee that has been ground to a consistency between extremely fine and powder.
It was invented and has undergone development in Milan, Italy, since the beginning of the 20th century, but up until the mid 1940s it was a beverage produced solely with steam pressure. The invention of the spring piston lever machine and its subsequent commercial success changed espresso into the beverage we know today, produced with between 9 and 10 atmospheres, or Bars, of pressure.
The qualitative definition of espresso includes a thicker consistency than drip coffee, a higher amount of dissolved solids than drip coffee per relative volume, and a serving size that is usually measured in shots, which is about 1-2 oz in size. Espresso is chemically complex and volatile, with many of its chemical components degrading from oxidation or loss of temperature. Properly brewed espresso has three major parts: the heart, body and, the most distinguishing factor, the presence of crema, which is a reddish-brown foam which floats on the surface of the espresso. It is composed of vegetable oils, proteins and sugars. Crema has elements of both emulsion and foam colloid.
As a result of the high-temperature brewing process, all of the flavours and chemicals in a typical cup of coffee are concentrated. Some people prefer a single or double shot of espresso instead of one or two cups of coffee to get a quick shot of caffeine. Because of its intense and highly concentrated ingredients (including caffeine) espresso lends itself to mixing into other coffee based drinks, such as lattes, cappuccino, macchiati and mochas, without being overly diluted in the resulting drink.
INGREDIENTS
Makes 8 sevings
For the pâte brisée (makes one 8- or 9-inch crust)
1¼ cup flour
6 tablespoons cold sweet butter, cut into bits
2 tablespoons cold vegetable shortening
¼ teaspoon salt
For the mocha mousse Filling
6 oz extra-bittersweet chocolate, such as that made by Lindt
4 tablespoons sweet butter
2 eggs, separated
2 teaspoons instant espresso powder
3 tablespoons hot coffee or espresso
1 tablespoon sugar
½ cup heavy cream, whipped
Chocolate curls
8 oz semisweet chocolate
1. To prepare the pâte brisée, in a large bowl, cut the butter, shortening, and salt into the flour until the mixture resembles coarse meal.
2. Add 3 tablespoons ice water, toss the mixture until the water is incorporated, and form the dough into a ball.
3. Knead the dough lightly with heel of the hand against a smooth surface for a few seconds, and re-form it into a ball.
4. Wrap dough in plastic wrap and chill for 1 hour before rolling out.
5. On a lightly floured surface, roll out pâte brisée dough to a ⅛-inch thick rectangle.
6. Place 12 X 3-inch barquette pans side by side, in 2 rows of 6 on a clean surface.
7. Lay pastry over the top of barquettes and run rolling pin across the top to cut pastry to fit pans.
8. Gently press pastry into barquettes with your fingers. Chill for 30 minutes.
9. To make the tart base, on a lightly floured surface, roll out pâte brisée dough to a ⅛-inch thick, 9-by-12-inch rectangle.
10. Fit pastry into an 8-by-11-inch rectangular tart pan with removable bottom. Chill for 10 or 15 minutes.
11. Preheat oven to 375ºF.
12. Line pastry shell with aluminum foil and fill with pie weights or dried beans to prevent pastry from puffing up and shrinking while baking. Bake in the center of oven for 15-20 minutes.
13. Remove weights and foil and continue to bake shell until crust is golden brown and dry.
14. Let cool before filling.
15. To make the mocha mousse filling, in a medium saucepan or double boiler over simmering water, heat bittersweet chocolate and butter until melted.
16. Beat egg yolks in a mixing bowl.
17. Gradually whisk chocolate mixture into egg yolks.
18. Dissolve instant espresso in hot coffee and stir into chocolate.
19. Beat egg whites in a mixing bowl until soft peaks start to form.
20. Add sugar and continue to beat whites until stiff.
21. Whisk about one third of egg whites into chocolate mixture.
22. Fold in remaining egg whites. Fold whipped cream into mousse.
23. Spoon into cooled tart shell and freeze until firm, at least several hours or overnight.
24. To make chocolate curls, melt semisweet chocolate in a saucepan or double boiler over simmering water and stir until smooth.
25. Using a rubber spatula, spread melted chocolate 1/16 inch thick on a smooth-surfaced baking sheet. Chill until chocolate hardens.
26. Remove from refrigerator and let chocolate begin to soften.
27. Using a metal pastry scraper held at a 45 degree angle to the baking sheet, gently loosen and scrape chocolate, with one continuous motion down the length of the baking sheet. If chocolate has reached the proper temperature, it will form small, tight curls. If it cracks, it’s too cold; let it warm more. If it sticks to the spatula, it’s too warm; chill slightly before continuing. Chill curls until firm.
28. Remove tart from freezer an hour or so before serving.
29. Decorate with chilled chocolate curls just before serving.
**From “Outdoor Entertaining” and “Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia”**
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