Chocolate Mousse...With A Difference

So Strap in Slappy, We're Going To Bean Town and I Don't Mean Boston

Okay, I’m about to tell you one of the weirdest things that I’ve discovered in the last several years. Trust me, it’s gonna sound very strange, and some of you may already have found out about this and you know where I’m going with it. I’m talking beans, garbanzo beans to be exact. These little suckers in the can, will run you about $1.79 at Whole Whatever or you can buy your garbanzos fresh and boil them yourself old school. However, in the name of speed and “hey, I have a job!” these cans are pretty easy. So let’s just start with that.

You bring your beans home. Maybe they’re going in soup, a side dish, a salad, a sauce. You open a can, and pour the beans into a strainer, rinse them and let the liquid contents of the can go down the drain. Not so fast! That liquid that I, and my mom and likely my Nona too, poured down the drain is Dessert Gold, and it has a name AQUAFABA!! Or as I like to say AQUAFABULOUS! Say it loud and proud!

Aquafaba or water from beans…. is a fancy name for the liquid you find in a can of garbanzos, and a few years back people (mainly Europeans, because of course it was) discovered that it’s an insanely great substitute for egg whites in all sorts of dishes, especially desserts.

Now wait a minute that stinky stuff that the beans come in, that you rinse off the beans before using them…WTF?!!! YES!

These desserts were made with Aquafaba.. The Pavlova, the marshmallows in the s’mores, the rose macarons, and the marshmallow for the Smookies that get dipped in chocolate and believe me…none of this stuff tastes like beans!

So now that we’ve got that straight, this bean juice is nothing short of a miracle, vegans love it, and when the prices of eggs shot sky high and got scarce, and everyone is talking bird flu, you don’t need eggs for these desserts.

But back to the mousse. This comes together in less than 1/2 hour and requires 3 ingredients: Bean Water, Sugar, and Chocolate. Let me show you how this works.

Aquafaba Chocolate Mousse

Here’s What You Need:

7 oz of dark chocolate chopped

1/2 cup of the liquid from a can of NO SALT ADDED garbanzo beans….that salt part is very important as we don’t want all that salt in our dessert. I use canned from WF because there are only 10 mg of salt in those cans…other low sodium varieties are as much as 140 mg!

1/2 cup of white sugar

Here’s What To Do:

In a pot or heat-proof bowl, melt the chopped chocolate in a Bain Marie…that is hold the bowl containing the chocolate over a pot of barely simmering water, until it melts. Set it aside to cool a bit. Be careful that your chocolate doesn’t seize up when melting and turn into a chocolate rock. Keep the bowl with the chocolate barely above the water, and if it starts to seize up, you can add a tsp or two of coconut oil to keep it liquid.

In the bowl of a stand mixer add your bean water, and sugar.

You are going to now beat this mixture until it forms stiff peaks. This takes about 10 minutes. You can use a hand mixer too but the stand is a real labor saver.

Now take your slightly cooled melted chocolate and fold it into the whipped aquafaba. Fold it in so there are no streaks and it’s all blended evenly.

Pour the mousse into serving cups, cover with some cling film and set it in the fridge to chill for at least an hour. Then take it out and enjoy. I whipped some cream. Coconut cream makes a perfect vegan topping for this, or you can use regular whipping cream if you’re not totally vegan. I added a few raspberries (note the observer) and it was show time! Somebody even got a pupcup!!

So that’s Aquafaba Mousse. There are a lot of other desserts that I made for the Cafe when I was consulting for Cocoa Planet which was an entirely gluten free restaurant that also offered a lot of vegan options besides meat. I’ll be sharing some of them here. Aquafaba can even be used in cocktails instead of egg whites…who knew?!

Coming up next : Pavlova, Indian delights, and more cool dishes for hot weather!

Meanwhile, I’m always around for questions and comments and requests, just give me a shout out, and remember, over here it’s okay to play with your food!

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