Leftovers for Dessert

Sometimes the greatest challenge of a pastry chef is learning the art of creativity. How to use basic ingredients and components to make new and wonderful desserts. Creativity is definitely not one of my strengths, but I think baking offers an array of ideas in which to create endless possibilities, including Chocolate Mousse Pie.

This dessert was fun in jarring a little creativity. It uses two leftovers in the form of chocolate mousse and sweet pastry dough to make these mini inside out tarts So it reminds me little of using your leftovers in your fridge to create a new meal, so I thought about putting this into the category called “Leftovers for Dessert”.

Making this a great mini desserts that will impress your dinner guests and friends.

Come along and I will show you how I made it.

Preparing the Dough

First, I rolled out the leftover pate sucree and used a scalloped round cutter 1 3/4 -2″ in diameter and cut out the dough circles.

After cutting the dough, I dock the dough with little holes to allow it to bake without rising too much. You can use this fancy docking tool shown here, or just use a fork to poke a few holes.

Preparing the Mousse

With some leftover chocolate mousse, I had I didn’t want it to go to waste, so a great way to use it is by pouring into a mini silicone muffin mold and placed in the freezer. Once frozen, I removed them from the mold, they pop right out. I then placed them into a storage container, separated with layers of parchment paper, then into the freezer till ready to use.

Completing the Dessert-Chantilly Cream and Sugar Decorations

Once you have these two components done its time to complete the dessert adding two new components, Chantilly cream and sugar decorations.

Making the Chantilly Cream

To a mixer with whisk attachment, I placed 1/2 cup cream along with 1 TBS powdered sugar and whip till medium peaks form. A great tip is placing your mixing bowl along with the whisk into the fridge to chill before mixing. Once whipped, place in piping bag with a small star tip ( I used Ateco 823) and place in the fridge so its all ready when you go to decorate.

Making the Sugar Decorations

These are simple and easy to make to really bump up your desserts to another level and uses simple ingredients, sugar and water.

I lined a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside. In a small saucepan, I placed 1/2 cup sugar and just enough water to cover, maybe 1 TBS. This was brought to a boil and then boiled till the sugar starts to turn amber in color. Once this takes place I gave it a few seconds just as the color turns just light medium amber, and removed from the stove.

The syrup was swirled around a few seconds till the mixture resembled the consistency of honey. I spooned some of the sugar mixture out onto the baking sheet in my own freehand designs to form different decorations as seen here. Allowed this to cool and the decorations peel right off the paper. Careful on humid days as the decorations can become sticky.

Finishing the Dessert

Now we are set to put all of this together in a neat and impressive presentation, using what I call the two + two strategy. Two old and two new components.

All of your hard work now will pay off now as the fun begins. The pastry rounds were placed on a serving platter and then topped by a chocolate mousse, given a swirl of chantilly cream, then decorated with a sugar decoration. It makes for a neat and eye appealing mini dessert to serve. Mostly, I like to make these mini desserts and include them into a dessert trio for a fantastic dessert ending to a meal.