Raw Food Dessert: Chocolate Mousse Tart (p2) - An Easy To Make Raw Food Recipe

To fill this tart crust, I'm going to make a creamy, rich, chocolate mousse filling,
and the secret ingredient is avocado, but you will never know it's there.
All you're going to taste is rich and creamy.
So I'm going to use the food processor again to make the chocolate mousse,
and I'll start off with my sweeteners.
I'm going to use some Medjool dates again,
and this time, the dates have been soaked
because I don't want a dry, crumbly texture like I did with the pie crust;
I want it to be smooth and creamy.
So I soaked these in water for about a half an hour.
So we'll put the dates in the processor.
Then I'm going to add a very unique natural sweetener called agave nectar.
Agave nectar is made from the agave plant.
It's similar to a cactus, and it's a great sweetener to use in raw dishes.
Of course, it's raw.
But it's also a low glycemic sweetener, meaning that it won't spike your
blood sugar level the way that other concentrated sweeteners will.
It also doesn't have much color to it.
It has a very neutral taste.
So it's wonderful to use where you just want to imitate white sugar,
and that's what we're doing with this mousse.
So I'm going to add the agave nectar to the dates,
and then I'll process it to create a paste and get that nice and smooth.
We've got a nice, smooth paste there to work with.
I'll add a little bit of vanilla extract to that.
That's optional, but it really intensifies the chocolate flavor.
And now for the secret ingredient, the avocado.
I've mashed up a couple of avocados.
I've mashed them well so that they process easily
and so that I don't need to over-process it because you don t want to over-process avocado.
It can change the taste a little bit.
I just want to process it the minimum that I need to, so I mashed it well beforehand.
Add just a little water to that mixture to get it processing easily.
We can add more later if we need to.
And then I'll process that until it's smooth.
Don't worry, it's not going to be green.
We're going to be adding chocolate to this,
and it's going to turn it into a chocolate mousse as soon as we do.
You've got a couple of options when it comes to chocolate.
If you're not concerned with eating 100 percent raw,
you could use a good quality organic cocoa powder,
and that's what I'm going to do.
And that would be the only non-raw ingredient,
and it's going to be rich and chocolatey.
If you're trying to avoid chocolate, you could also use carob.
Carob powder is made from the carob fruit, and it looks similar to chocolate,
but it doesn't really taste like it.
But it's another option.
And recently, you can actually get raw cocoa powder nowadays.
It's a little more expensive, and you do need to order it online.
I give you some resources in the back of my book for doing that.
So you've got three options: organic cocoa powder, raw cocoa powder, or carob.
Go ahead and make it chocolatey.
I'm going to hold back a little on the cocoa powder.
Every cocoa powder has a different strength,
so you might want to start off with just a little less and then you can taste
it and you can always adjust up.
I'm going to add some water, thin it out a little bit.
And remember, with a food processor, you've got to scrape down periodically.
Isn't that starting to look like chocolate mousse?
Chocolate is so wonderful in desserts, and this mousse is so versatile.
You can use it in so many different things.
It's kind of like pâtés, but with desserts.
Just like the Not Tuna Pâté could become five different dishes,
this chocolate mousse can become five different dishes.
You could serve this plain just as a pudding;
you can fill a pie or tart crust, which is what we're going to do with it in a minute;
you could add more water and make a chocolate sauce;
you could leave the water out, and it would be a frosting, a chocolate frosting;
and then my favorite, you can put this in ice cube trays and then pop them out,
and you've got fudgesicles.
So this is a really, really versatile chocolate mousse.
It's looking good.
Nice and rich and creamy.
You can serve this right away.
It tastes good at room temperature.
Or if you chill it for a few hours,
it's going to get very firm so that you can make a clean slice.
I even like the way this pie tastes frozen.
You just put it in your freezer for two to four hours
and then let it thaw for about ten minutes before you serve it,
and it kind of has that ice cream cake taste to it.
There are so many variations to this dessert.
I mentioned all the things you can do with the chocolate mousse by itself,
but with this pie crust or tart crust, you could fill it with different things.
I also like to make a key lime mousse,
which is similar to this filling, but no chocolate.
I just blend the avocado with some lime juice and some of that agave nectar,
and you've got a delicious pie that tastes kind of like a lemon meringue pie.
You could also fill this pie crust or tart crust with fruit fillings.
You could just blend some berries-- blueberries, blackberries--with some dates.
Make a thick fruit filling, maybe fold back in some whole berries into it,
and you've got a fruit pie.
So there are just so many possibilities with raw desserts.
And for decoration, I'm going to add some fresh raspberries.
Raspberries go so well with chocolate.
You could also use sliced strawberries and decorate the entire pie that way, too.
Wow.
Now we're ready to unmold this tart.
Carefully.
Doesn't this look like it just came out of a bakery window?
This really is an incredible dessert,
and it makes an impressive, delicious finale to any elegant meal.