Chocolate Mousse Cake

After baking cookies, I finally decided to try baking a cake. Being a first timer, I chose the easiest. It was a simple chocolate mousse cake recipe adapted from Food magazine. I asked my dear sister, Tin, to help me on this since she has more experience in baking. Without her help, this would surely be a disaster. Actually, while we're doing this recipe I made a "stupid mistake". On the mousse part, I prepared 1 1/2 cup of all purpose cream when the recipe calls for only 1/2 cup of the cream. Arrgh. So there were some of the ingredients that went into waste. Anyway, lesson learned. Next time, I will carefully read the ingredients and steps. Sorry for the ugly piping (cake decoration) I still don't know how to use the piping bag. I still need a lot of practice.

Chocolate Mousse Cake

For the cake:
1/2 cup butter
1 cup semi-sweet choco chips
2 tbsp Dutch processed cocoa
3 eggs, separated
1 tbsp all-purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar

For the mousse:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose cream, divided, 1 cup to be chilled solid
1 1/4 cups semi-sweet choco chips
3 eggs, separated
1 tbsp unflavored gelatin
3 tbsps cold water
1/3 cup sugar

For the topping: (optional)
1 tbsp cocoa powder
3 tbsps powdered sugar, divided
1/2 cup all-purpose cream, chilled

Make the cake:

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Line a 9-inch round springform pan with non-stick baking paper.
2. In a small saucepan, melt butter, choco chips and cocoa. Stir until smooth. Transfer to a medium bowl and cool.
3. Add egg yolks and flour to cooled mixture. Stir with a wire whisk until smooth.
4. Place egg whites in a grease-free mixing bowl. Beat with electric mixer on medium high speed until foamy. Gradually add sugar. Increase speed to high and continue beating until stiff but not dry.
5. With a wire whisk, gently fold in chocolate-egg mixture into whites. Pour into springform pan, tapping pan gently on the table to remove any air pockets.
6. Bake for 20-22 minutes. Remove from oven and cool on wire rack. Cake will shrink as it cools. Put the cake back into the pan.

Make the mousse:

1. In a small saucepan, over low heat, heat the 1/2 cup all-purpose cream that's NOT chilled. Add choco chips and stir until smooth.
2. Stir a little of the chocolate mixture into egg yolks to prevent the yolks from curdling. Pour tempered yolks back to chocolate mixture.
3. In a bowl, combine gelatin and cold water. Add to chocolate yolk mixture and heat to dissolve gelatin. Remove from heat and transfer to a medium bowl to cool until just warm.
4. Place egg whites in a grease-free mixing bowl. Beat with electric mixer at medium high speed until foamy. Gradually add sugar and continue beating until stiff but not dry. Gently fold in chocolate-yolk mixture until uniformly blended. Set aside.
5. Place the 1 cup chilled cream in a medium bowl. With a wire whisk, mix cream until smooth, but do not whip. Add a little egg white mixture to lighten the cream.
6. Add the rest of the egg white mixture and fold until uniformly blended. Pour mixture over cake, tapping pan on the table to remove air pockets.
7. Smoothen top with a knife or angled metal spatula. Chill overnight in refrigerator.

To put topping: (if using)

1. After the cake has chilled overnight, run a wet metal spatula around sides of mousse. Release sides of springform pan.
2. Using a fine sifter, sift 1 tbsp cocoa over cake. Sift about 1/2 to 1 tbsp of the powdered sugar over cake but not entirely covering the cocoa powder.
3. Whip chilled cream with remaining powdered sugar and pipe cream around the edges of mousse cake. Transfer cake to a platter before serving.