Making White Chocolate Mousse
I think of white chocolate mousse a medium for another flavor versus an end in itself. I mean honestly…is there anyone out there who’s really that into white chocolate? However we can use the cocoa butter that white chocolate contains to give an ethereal herbal flavor like mint a form and a texture. Since we only need the white chocolate for its foam-reinforcing cocoa butter, not its flavor, we can go lighter than we would with a chocolate mousse. I make mine with:
4 ounces pâte à bombe
4 ounces white chocolate
8 ounces (1 cup) heavy cream, whipped to soft peaks
Place the white chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl. Zap it in the microwave for 10 seconds, stir it and zap again. Repeat until the white chocolate it about 70% melted, then use the residual heat to melt it the rest of the way. Simply stir until it’s smooth.
Combine it in a bowl with the pâte à bombe.
Stir it together. As with chocolate mousse, the mixture will stiffen up a bit. Worry not.
Now whisk in the whipped cream about a third at a time.
Done!
Finish it however you like. Here I’ve added about three drops each of peppermint oil and green food color.
People will know that it’s a mint mousse, but not necessarily that there’s white chocolate in it. So much the better.
interesting… if you only want the cocoa butter, do you think you could make it only using cocoa butter? or does the lecithin in chocolate help stabilise the mixture?
Chris
In theory you absolutely could, Chris. However pure food grade cocoa butter is harder to get…at least here in the States.
– Joe
it’s not that hard to find here if you know the right shop (only one in the whole city that I’ve found)… just damned expensive – $40 for 800g.
Interesting. I LOATHE white chocolate. It makes me feel sick. But I wonder if it would work for me as a metier.
I have a feeling it will. A little bit just adds structure. But try it and see!
– J
While I get where you’re coming from, some of us love white chocolate best, without any additional flavours. 😛 Though I could totally see making this.
Someone needs to hold the end up for white chocolate, Felicity! Thanks for your comment!
– Joe
White chocolate is just so sweet and rich that I find it cloying. I wonder if the mint flavor and freezing it would make it more palatable? I can’t wait to see the finished product since I love the flavor of bourbon and chocolate together – also chocolate and mint.
ADding more whipped cream and mint almost eliminates the flavor of the white chocolate entirely. Which is great as far as I’m concerned!
– Joe
Hi Joe,
I’ve tried to melt white chocolate before, but was unsuccessful. It kept seizing. I tried the microwave method and the double boiler method (being very careful not to get water in it) and both ways I was never able to get a smooth liquid white chocolate. Does the quality of the white chocolate matter when melting it? Also, how would you “rescue” a seized white chocolate? Thanks!
Eva
Recently I’ve done some classes with one of Australia’s top chocolate pastry chef’s – she recommended NEVER melting your chocolate over a double boiler (despite 90% of the internet recommending it) as the risk of water into the product is too high (her exact words were… “don’t do it. not ever.) Microwave, very slowly – 1 minute then 30 seconds at a time is fine until the chocolate is about 75% melted, then stir until the rest is done (unless you happen to have a chocolate melting tank lying around, then use that ;))
a great point to remember is if you stir it too soon, ie, before a lot is melted, you will create a big lump that can’t heat evenly and you’ll end up with really hot spots and cool spots – bad news for chocolate!
if the chocolate is ending up grainy ie you can feel little bits on your tongue – you’ve overheated it, and there’s not much that can be done other than feeding that to small children that don’t know any better and starting over.
I agree with all of that, which means this woman is clearly a genius! All I’d say is that for smaller quantities of chocolate you want to use shorter bursts of heat. A full minute on high would destroy a few ounces of chocolate — even 30 seconds in many cases!
– J
Hi Eva! That’s interesting. Did it ever reach a liquid state at all?
Hi Joe,
No I was never able to get it to a liquid state. It just kept seizing and I tried maybe 3 or 4 times using up my supply. I’ve never had a problem with regular chocolate, and it was the first and last time I ever tried to melt white chocolate. Maybe, as Chris pointed out, I had hot spots and cold spots from stirring before the heat was more evenly distributed. Can the quality of the white chocolate play a part? It was just some I found at the grocery store.
Eva
I know this is an old post but I just wanted to comment for future readers; this has happened to me before but only with some chocolate that was past it’s ‘use by’ date (or very close to it.
Thanks, Sharon!
– Joe
I recently made a white chocolate mousse but found that the flavour was more pronounced towards the end of the mouthful. The first taste was one of the custard.
I did not use this recipe…the usual mousse recipes of egg whites and whipped cream
That works!
– J
Hi Joe,
If I wanted to use this recipe to make a chocolate mousse would I use the same amount of dark chocolate?
Thanks,
Joe
Hey Joe!
Just use the chocolate mousse recipe that’s up on the blog under Pastry Components. It’s largely the same, but with a bit more chocolate so it has more body.
Cheers,
– Joe
Hi Joe,
can i add some gelatine to firm it up so it holds up better as a cake filling? how would you recommend it be added?
thanks, H
Hi Hannah!
You certainly can do that. The place to add it is the whipped cream. Hydrate your gelatin, , melt it briefly in the microwave and allow it to cool a bit if it’s hot at that point. Once your whipped cream is at the soft peak stage, add it in, then carry on with the recipe as written.
Best of luck and thanks for the question!
-Joe