Cooking the French Way

:

(Neighbor friend and Groovy Girl 

with finished Chocolate Mousse)

Groovy Girl picked up this skinny little cookbook from the local library.  In fact she picked out two cookbooks.  Wonder who she gets this cooking thing from?

She had a friend over the other night for a cooking "play date."  For real.  They asked if they could get together to cook something and obviously Groovy Girl had this in mind.  They read down the list of ingredients to see if
I had them all.  It was a blissful pantry moment for me when I could say "yes" to the list of ingredients. I think the packets of gelatin were pretty old and I'm not sure when I would have bought something like this-I think maybe it was a jam-making experiment.  There must be a healthier, more kind option than these packets-but I had them!

After browsing the book I liked many of the recipes (yes, several crepe recipes) and information is included on French regions, traditions, and holidays.  There is also a great beginner's prep guide of ingredients, tools, and vocabulary for the young wanna-be chef.


Chocolate Mousse (56)

1 envelope unsweetened gelatin powder
1/4 cold water
2 squares unsweetened baking chocolate
1 square semisweet baking chocolate
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup sugar
1 pt. heavy cream

1. In a medium bowl, combine gelatin with water and set aside.
2. In a medium saucepan, combine milk and chocolate.  Over low heat, stir until the chocolate is completely melted.  Add the sugar.  Stir until it dissolves completely.
3. In a  medium bowl, use and electric mixer to beat the heavy cream until it thickens and forms soft peaks.
4. Pour the chocolate mixture into a large mixing bowl.  Use a spoon to combine the gelatin mixture with the chocolate.
5. Use a rubber spatula to fold one-third of the cream into the chocolate.  Fold in remaining cream.
6. Pour into an attractive serving bowl or into individual serving dishes and cover with a lid.
7. Cool in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours or overnight.  Decorate with whipped cream or grated sweet chocolate before serving.

Serves 4.

(We added  some crumbled brownies that were a little dry and
a dollop of whipped cream made it perfect.)

They wanted it served in fancy glasses.  I said your pudding will be ready in two hours.  Groovy Girl's response was "It's chocolate mousse, Mom.  NOT pudding."  Well, okay, then.  Enjoy.  I cut down on how much sugar we used because I already had freshly whipped cream with a hint of sugar from a recent pancake morning breakfast, by adding that cream in we didn't need the other sugar.  We also tightened up the cooling time because it was an after dinner play date and bedtimes were calling.  Our beer fridge in the basement is super chill so we covered them in glass pyrex dishes and crossed our fingers.  After a walk/dog chase across the street we came back to cold mousse.  The girls tried to lick the glasses clean!