Quick and Easy Chocolate Mousse

What do you when you have 15 egg yolks laying around? Make chocolate mousse of course!

I love most things meringue based, so while all these egg whites are living full and delicious (yet short) lives, the egg yolks are left to wallow in their unfulfilled destinies.

So if you’re anything like me you often have a lot of egg yolks laying around and nothing to do with them. There are plenty of things you make with egg yolks; crème pâtissière, custard, crème brûlée, mayonnaise, hollandaise etc. I wanted something nice and easy that could be eaten by itself (and wouldn’t require a chef’s torch!), and that’s where the mousse came in.

I used a Martha Stewart recipe for this, but slightly adapted as I didn’t have as much cream as I thought I did and I had less chocolate (I was also going for a recipe that I didn’t have to buy anything for, it was 9pm after all). Despite the lack of cream and less chocolate it was still the richest chocolate mousse I have ever eaten, I could only eat a few spoonfuls!

Ingredients:

• 4  egg yolks
• 3 tablespoons sugar
• 300ml double cream
• 170g dark chocolate (min 60% cocoa solids), melted
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Whisk the egg yolks, 2 tablespoons sugar and 150 double cream in a medium saucepan. Heat over a medium/low heat, stirring constantly for 3-4 minutes, do not boil. Remove from heat and strain into a bowl. Whisk in melted chocolate and vanilla. You’ll end up with a custardy consistency. Chill until cooled.

With an electric mixer, beat remaining cream and sugar together until stiff peaks form. Stir 1/3 of the whipped cream into the cool custard mixture, and then every gently fold in the rest of the the cream with a rubber spatula.

Spoon into serving dishes, cover and chill for at least 30 minutes before serving.

And voila! Your egg yolks have new meaning and can die satisfied!