Raspberry Chocolate Cakes with Citrus Mousse

I couldn't resist buying a punnet of these gloriously plump ruby-red raspberries from my local fruit store. I eagerly decided to inaugurate my little cake rings just purchased the other day. Like any food lover I'm obsessed by those beautiful little tarts and cakes you see in every parisian cake window & have always wondered if I could ever replicate something close to that at home. Ok today was the day.

I decided on a two layer flourless chocolate cake base with a touch of orange zest added to it to compliment the citrus mousse. In between the chocolate cake layers was a chocolate mousse for added volume. A thin layer of apricot glaze was then brushed to set the delightful raspberries. The final citrus mousse topping was a combination of lemon and orange, which I tend to prefer as it is less tart.

I ended up with left-over chocolate mousse just enough for two so the next day they served very nicely as an evening chocolate fix!

Moederdag...

Happy Moederdag..."Mother's Day" to all those lovely Mothers everywhere around the globe. I wanted to bake something befitting for the occasion but with so many wonderful recipes in my newfound books It became rather difficult to choose. Then I thought, everyone loves a good Citrus and Poppyseed cake so that was it. A traditional Orange and Poppyseed Cake jazzed up. With this cake I added equal amounts of Orange and Lemon zest and decided to make it a layered cake with Citrus Mousse in between. It was a lovely combination as the mousse gave the cake a wonderful lightness which played with the creamy citrus cheese frosting. I must admit visually it didn't come out quite the way I had anticipated but nevertheless it was met with great enthusiasm on the day.

Warm Chocolate Raspberry Tart

Greetings All! I've finally mustered the courage to post my first creation. Still a fair way from any gourmet magazine cover but nevertheless " a good start" as hubs says. This recipe is from Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermé. I decided to finish it off with my first time fruit glaze. I found it slightly gluggy but I think it was poor technique on my part. Oh well, practice makes perfect!

Following my first tart recipe I decided to try a chocolate tart dough. I didn't want to repeat the same filling as the choc raspberry tart although there was no doubt in my mind that it would be simply divine. So I decided to experiment and "attempt" a lemon cream layer with a chocolate souffle layer on top. This is the result. The idea of combining Lemon flavours with Chocolate was from a recipe from this book and the master himself was not wrong. The tanginess of the lemon cream balances the velvety sweetness of the chocolate souffle and more subdued but equally scrumptious chocolate tart crust. Alas, as with souffles, it somewhat "deflated" after just a few hours. Nevertheless the texture was more dense which was quite yummy cold!