Indulgent, rich, and decadent. Everything I love in a dessert. Oh...and CHOCOLATE! The addition of the coffee and hazelnut in the "soil" enhance the dark chocolate mousse at the bottom. A bit of a nostalgic dessert for me as I remember eating these quite a lot when I was a kid. I always used to love their name and appearance, and I still find them amusing to this day! I decided to prepare them in a cupcake tin with liners so that the portions were a bit smaller, but feel free to use whatever you have at hand. I hope this dessert wakes up the kid in you too!
Honestly, I could eat pizza and chocolate almost every single day of the week if it wasn't for the fact that I care too much about keeping my weight in check. But that combo just fuels my soul and makes my inner fat child so so so happy. When I was a kid, I used to demolish a few slices of pizza and order up a chocolate "tierrita" at my favorite pizza place in Puerto Rico. I have no idea why I stopped doing that. But with that same spirit, I decided to make a more grown up version of the "tierrita" I used to get as a kid.
This little bebi uses rich, bittersweet chocolate for the mousse. You can turn up the sweetness level by just adding more sugar, but I love me some DARK chocolate.
The addition of coffee, hazelnuts, and salt makes this more of a grown up tasting mousse pot. However, you always have to balance out "tierrita" with some crushed Oreos or else, is it even authentic? #sponsorgoals You will definitely need an electric whisk or a stand mixer with a whisk attachment for this recipe. If you happen to be married to Thor, then put him to work...hehe.
Kitchen equipment you will need:
Blender
Electric Whisk or Stand Mixer fitted with Whisk Attachment
Pot
2 Mixing Bowls
1 Heatproof Bowl to melt chocolate over a bain marie (will explain later)
Spatula for folding through the Whipped Cream
Spoons
12-hole Cupcake Tray
Cupcake Liners
Baking Sheet
Parchment Paper
Ingredients:
Makes 12 cupcake sized mousse pots (but you can make them as big or as small as you want)
For the Mousse:
1 1/2 cups Bittersweet Chocolate or 75% Dark Chocolate (whatever dark chocolate you have at hand would be ok as well)
3 eggs
1/4 cup White Granulated Sugar (You can add more or less depending on how sweet you would like your mousse pot to be - the soil will add some extra sweetness at the end as well)
1 teaspoon Unsweetened Cocoa Powder
1 1/2 cups Heavy Cream
For the Chocolate Soil:
1/4 cup White Granulated Sugar
1/4 cup Hazelnuts
1/2 teaspoon Salt
2 tablespoons All Purpose Flour
1 teaspoon Instant Coffee
2 1/2 tablespoons Unsalted Butter, melted
4 Oreo Cookies
Mint Sprigs to garnish if ya fancy
Ok. Let's GO.
RECIPE LEVEL: Intermediate (just because folding stuff can sometimes be tricky)
HANDS-ON TIME: 20 - 25 minutes
SETTING TIME: 2 hours
BAKING TIME: 10 - 12 minutes
Method:
1. Set yourself up. Line cupcake tray with liners. Measure out ingredients for mousse and set up your electric whisk.
2. Place about 2 inches of water in a pot and place the heatproof bowl on top. Simmer water on medium heat and place chopped bittersweet chocolate in bowl. This is called a "bain marie" in french or "baño de maría" in spanish (oh god - trilingual identity crisis in the making...) You are slowly melting the chocolate without letting it get too hot by using steam instead of direct heat. Once chocolate is melted, turn off heat, and set bowl aside to cool for 5 minutes.
3. Place eggs and sugar into a bowl and whisk until ribbon stage (which means it is pale, creamy, and bubbly - when you pull out the whisk, the mixture leaves a bit of a trail behind.)
4. Once you have gotten to that stage, take your now cooled melted chocolate and pour it slowly into the egg and sugar mixture. Fold it gently with your spatula until everything is incorporated.
5. In a separate bowl, place heavy cream and whip until soft peaks form (do not over whip or you will end up with butter...I love butter, but not for this). You are looking for the cream to just hold some shape.
6. Carefully spoon about a third of the whipped cream into the chocolate, egg, and sugar mixture and fold through until just incorporated. Continue to fold through the rest of the cream until everything is incorporated. You have just made a MOUSSE!
7. Carefully spoon your mousse into the cupcake liners. Make sure not to overfill. You may need to bang the tray a few times on a surface just to get the mousse to sit level instead the liners.
8. Place tray in the refrigerator and let set for 2 hours. The mousse will last you 2-3 days if kept in the fridge.
9. Make the soil in the meantime by placing the sugar, hazelnuts, coffee, flour, and salt in a blender or food processor. Once that looks like a fine powder, add the melted butter until all the ingredients start coming together.(Don't clean your blender or food processor yet! You will be blending the Oreo Cookies soon.)
10. Place the soil on a parchment lined baking sheet and bake at 350F for 10-12 minutes.
11. Once baked, take the tray out and let the soil cool. Take a couple of forks and break it up so that it gets even more fine.
12. Place Oreo Cookies in the blender and blend until a fine powder. Dump cookies into the soil and mix together with your hands. Your soil is done! (And it is SO TASTY so don't just eat it all as is - leave some for the mousse!)
13. Once the mousses are set, spoon however much soil you would like on top. Garnish with mint sprigs if ya fancy and devour!
Leaving the iconic Matilda chocolate scene here because I still can't believe this was considered a "punishment." It's more like a choco dreaaaaaaaaam.
If you make these little beauts, tag me @masamamafood on Instagram - I wanna see!
Buen provecho!
Tag me @masamamafood!
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