Chocolate Mouse Gateaux, light and moist sweetened with Stevia

This recipe is actually an assembly of two earlier recipes I posted. Both of which I like a lot and together they are just a perfect light summer cake.

I made this for my birthday, it was incredible, melts in the mouth, nice moist sponge and very satiating, no need to over eat.

I put spare cake in the freezer and had it when I came back from my holiday, it was just as if I had made it fresh.

So if you need to have a treat cake in stock for unexpected visitors, this is perfect.

It’s also easy to make this cake dairy free, just replacing the double cream with coconut milk will make this as close to Paleo as is possible when making cakes.

 

If you are wondering what my fancy berry decoration is, they are not some kind of weird frankenberry rasberry-strawberry hybrid, even though they look it! They are in fact Strasberries.

The Strasberry is a variety of the wild strawberry, with a raspberry-like appearance, originally developed in South America in the 1900s. It is not a hybrid of the two fruits. It is similarly soft textured, with characteristics that are similar to raspberries, such as being a deeper red, being rounder and having a bumpy exterior. They are also smaller than a strawberry and have deeper seeds. The species were threatened by extinction until they were reintroduced as a commercial variety by a Dutch farmer in the twenty first century.  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strasberry)

 

Coconut Flour Almond-Chocolate Sponge Cake:

Makes: a round 13cm cake that is 5.5cm high – Cut in 3-4 layers and use 2-3 for Ferrero Cake.

Prep time: 10 min

Cooking: 20min at 200 degree celsius

For the sponge cake base you need:

• 4 medium eggs
• 80g ground almonds – mixed ground nuts work too.
• 4 tbsp. unsweetened Cocoa powder
• 50g dark chocolate
• 60g organic virgin Coconut oil
• 1 tbsp hot water with 1 tbsp instant coffee – optional!
• couple of drops Vanilla extract – optional
• 50ml Amaretto
• 1tsp backing powder
• 2-4 knife-tips Stevia-sweet 90% powder dissolved in 1 table spoons hot water

Note: getting the sweetness to the desired level is a matter of trial and error, the best thing is to start with a smaller amount of whatever Stevia you have on hand, it can be ready-use, liquid or tabs (need to be dissolved too), adding more is easier than diluting – you could end up with a huge amount of treat -Don’t have any Stevia yet? – you can always use normal sweetener products until you are set up.

Instructions:

Separate eggs into two bowls, add part stevia extract powder to the egg white part to the egg yolks.

Beat the egg whites to a stiff peak, set a side.

Melt coconut oil with chopped chocolate,the instant coffee solution and Amaretto together in a double boiler.

Beat the egg yolks until well mixed, add them to melted ingredients, mix well.

Add the ground almonds and the Cocoa powder with an electric mixer until well combined.

Take a rubber ladle to add the stiff egg white bit by bit under the nut/cocoa mass, take care not to lose all the fluffiness you have just beaten into the egg white.

Combine to smooth mass and fill into a small greased baking pan or silicone mold (-no grease necessary).

Place in the pre-heated oven for 20 min, check if it is ready by piercing centre it with a knitting needle, if the needle comes out clean, the inside is cooked.

Leave to cool for 1hour on cooling rack.

Cut the cooled cake into 3-4 layers. For the Mouse Cake you only need one layer about 2.5cm thick.

Use the rest of the cake to cut layers for the Ferrero Rocher layer cake – Paleo style, or cut and freeze them with grease proof paper to stop sticking together for another day.

 

TIPS:

– you can use normal flour to make this recipe too.

– freeze the additional layers separating them with grease proof paper until you want to use them later.

– keep in the fridge if making ahead of use

–  this cake freezes beautifully.

 

 

Super light dark Cocoa/ Chocolate mousse:

Makes: approx. 400ml container finished fluffy mouse

Prep time: 10min

Cool/ set time: 2hours in the fridge

You need:

• 125ml Double Cream (you could also use coconut milk or cream)
• 4 sheets of leaf Gelatine (6.6g)
• 4 medium Eggs separated
• 2 1/2 tbsp (25g) Dark, unsweetened Cocoa powder
• 2-3 knife-tips Stevia-sweet 90% powder dissolved in 1 table spoons hot water

Note: getting the sweetness to the desired level is a matter of trial and error, the best thing is to start with a smaller amount of whatever Stevia you have on hand, it can be ready-use, liquid or tabs (need to be dissolved too), adding more is easier than diluting – you could end up with a huge amount of treat -Don’t have any Stevia yet? – you can always use normal sweetener products until you are set up.

Start by soaking the gelatine leafs in 125ml cold water.

Use the time when the gelatine is soaking to mixing the egg whites until they form soft peaks. Keep the egg yolks for later.

Once the leafs turn to jelly, take them out and squeeze until they are free from most of the water.

Pour double cream into a bowl suitable to use in a water bath/ double boiler.

Melt gelatine into the double cream over the water bath.

Then add in the cocoa and stir till mixed to smooth fluid – take care not to overheat the gelatine mix.

I take it off the heat once it’s melted, you can always push it back on the heat if it sets too fast.

Now  beat in one egg yolk at a time “on high speed”.

Add the gelatine-cocoa-cream mix to the fluffy-egg-mix on medium speed until the mixture is an even colour and combined well. (Yes – this works, it does not collapse.)

The mixture is now ready to pour on top of the cooled biscuit base that has been prepared with a cake ring that is lined with grease proof paper for easy removal after setting.

Let it set in the fridge until set for  approximately 2 hours.

Remove from cake ring and decorate with fresh fruit.

 

TIPS:

– just make the mousse as a dessert and serve with fresh berries.

– replace the double cream in the filling with coconut milk/ cream for dairy free version.

 

Here’s the calorie count.

One slice if divided into 8 servings approximately   400 kcal’s per slice excluding decoration.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can never go wrong with a chocolate mousse cake especially when it is loaded with protein and totally gluten free.

MK xx