Chocolate Mousse & Shortbread Cookies

I am so excited!

It’s Chocolate Week here at CeramicCanvas.com – an entire week dedicated to our favorite ingredient.

First, I should confess. While I do love chocolate, I am not the biggest fan of dessert. Dessert has never been my thing. Even when I am at a restaurant that has a respected pastry chef, I almost always pass on dessert and ask for the cheese menu. I’m a sucker for a good cheese selection.

So, no one could have been more surprised than me when I was taken with these sandwich cookies while thumbing through my copy of The Golden Book of Chocolate.

If I retraced my steps to identify the exact moment where I got sucked in, I think it was when I realized that the recipe called for using a mousse. It looked so light, so airy. I was hooked. I was also intrigued by the chocolate shortbread recipe.

As you may remember from the Pecan Sandies post, I love cookies made with shortbread dough. While it can be harder to roll (easily breaks apart), I find shortbread cookies to be more buttery, light and crumbly than the standard cookie dough.

So just like that, I knew the recipe that wanted to kick off Ceramic Canvas’ first Chocolate Week.

I figured that neither the mousse nor the cookie would be too sweet. And I decided to finish the cookie off with strawberries dipped in honey.

The verdict? I love them. The mousse is light, airy and chocolaty. The cookie was full of chocolate flavor without being overwhelming – which is important since both the cookie and mousse are all about the chocolate. And the strawberry added the perfect element of sweet (the honey) and sharpness (the fruit itself) to give the cookie real balance.

My only hesitation is that I wouldn’t classify this cookie as a ‘shortbread.’ Its texture is not crumbly like a standard shortbread/sandie but rather it is a little soft and chewy. This isn’t necessarily bad – it’s just not what I was expecting. Next time I will experiment with the cookie recipe to achieve a more crumbly texture. I think it will be a nice counter to the smooth texture of the mousse.

I will definitely make these babies again. Enjoy!

And stay tuned for the next the installment of Chocolate Week.

CHOCOLATE MOUSSE & SHORTBREAD COOKIES

Via The Golden Book of Chocolate

Shortbread:

½ cup all-purpose flour

¼ cup confectioner sugar

3 TBL unsweetened cocoa powder

1 TBL ground almonds

3 TBL unsalted butter, diced and cold

1 large egg, lightly beaten

4 TBL honey

Mousse:

12oz semisweet chocolate, finely chopped

3 cups heavy cream

8 strawberries

confectioner sugar, for dusting

Shortbread: Mix flour, confectioner sugar, cocoa and almonds in a medium bowl. Add butter and rub in with your finger tips until the mixture resembles fine crumbs (use pastry cutter as an alternative).

Make well in the center and pout the eggs in a little at a time mixing with your fingers until the mixture comes together but is not sticky. You may not need all of the egg.

Dust with flour and wrap in plastic wrap. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Gently heat honey. Take a strawberry by the stem and dip it into the honey. Set aside on plate. Repeat with remaining strawberries.

Mousse: Place the chocolate in a large bowl. Bring 1¼ cups of the cream to a boil over medium heat. Pour over chocolate. Stir until melted and smooth. Set aside, until ready to use.

Whip the remaining heavy cream until thick. Fold into the chocolate mixture. Refrigerate until ready to use.

Preheat oven to 350˚. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone mat. Roll out pastry to ¼” thick. With a fluted 2-inch cookie cutter cut out 24 disks. Place on prepared baking sheets. Bake for 8-10 minutes. Cool on wire rack.

Spoon mousse into a piping bag with a star nozzle. Place a shortbread cookie on a plate and pipe a spiral of mousse on top. Cover with shortbread and mousse. Top with more shortbread, Dust with confectioner sugar and top with a strawberry.

Makes 8 cookies.

Tagged as: chocolate, mousse, shortbread, strawberry, summer