Ina's Pumpkin Mousse

Still need something for Thanksgiving dessert?

Well you might want to mull this one over. Ina Garten has a bunch of pumpkin mousse recipes in her repertoire. Some have a banana in it, some dark rum, some are made with a graham cracker crust. I prefer the one with dark rum. Quelle surprise.

You make it a day (or two) before Thanksgiving and stick it in the fridge. And flavorful? Oh yes. No last minute fussing on Thanksgiving day either. You just stick a whole gingersnap in the top and serve. Only takes about 15 minutes to make too. Can't beat that. And you can really play around with nice glasses to serve it in. I like the wine glass best (although I filled it too full). I've also made it in small ice tea glasses, highball glasses and once in some pretty glass bowls. Ya gotta have glass so you can see the layers.

If you can't use it this year, copy it and save it for next year. I have a whole file like that!
 
Pumpkin Mousse
(Adapted from Barefoot Contessa At Home)
 

 
Ingredients:
 
1/4 cup dark rum
1 packet (2 teaspoons) unflavored gelatin powder
1  15 ounce can pumpkin (not pie filling)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar (lightly packed)
2 extra-large egg yolks
2 teaspoons grated orange zest
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 1/2 cups whipping cream
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
10 chopped gingersnaps
8-10 whole gingersnaps
1 1/2 cups whipping cream, whipped and sweetened lightly

Method:

Place the rum in a bowl and sprinkle the gelatin on top. Set aside for 10 minutes or so.
In a large bowl, whisk together the pumpkin, sugar, brown sugar, egg yolks, orange zest, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt. Melt the gelatin over hot water until it is clear. Immediately whisk the gelatin into the pumpkin mixture.
Whip the heavy cream with the vanilla until soft peaks form. Mix into the pumpkin mixture.
In another bowl, whip the last 1 1/2 cups whipping cream and sweeten it with sugar slightly.

To assemble: spoon some of the pumpkin mixture into glasses. Add a layer of whipped cream, some broken gingersnaps and repeat the layers, ending with a layer of pumpkin. Top with a dollop of whipped cream.

Cover and refrigerate for 4 hours or overnight.
To serve, place a whole gingersnap into whipped cream.
Serves 8-10 depending on glass size.

Port Wine Gelée

Years ago when we lived in Michigan we went to a dinner party hosted by Peter, a bachelor friend. It's been a while, but what's remained in my memory is the excellence of the meal. Not one of us had a clue our old friend was such a talented chef. We were served a perfectly dressed tossed salad, individual filet mignons, a lovely spoon bread and Port Wine Gelée for dessert. And he did all the cooking, no help. Very impressive. Who knew? After all, he could have taken the easy way out and done his entertaining at a restaurant; most single guys did back then...we were a pretty big group.

Of course I just had to have the spoonbread and gelée recipes. Wasn't easy. Peter didn't want to part with the gelée recipe... turned out it was a very old family recipe, handed down from his grandmother. In the end he relented - I pestered him unmercifully. He had get an OK from his mother and sister too. There are lots of recipes that use port wine, but I've never found one like this.

For some reason it's very much a recipe for the holidays. Special. Festive. Unusual. Light. It seems to me that Christmas would be the ideal time to try this. You have to make it ahead - just whip the cream at the last minute. It serves a lot of people and your biggest problem will be finding a pretty tray on which to unmold it and some lovely fruit for decorating or perhaps even some holly. I used the biggest (unfortunately also the most boring) mold I own. Why I have never purchased a prettier one I can't imagine. I saw several colorful gelées in Gourmet magazine a few years ago made in elegant molds like this one:

A couple times I have cut the recipe in half when I didn't need quite so much. At a guess I would say this recipe easily serves 12-16 people.

Peter's Port Wine Gelée

Ingredients:

5 envelopes Knox gelatin (approximately 12 1/2 teaspoons)
1 1/2 cups cold water
2 lemons, rinds and juice
1 orange, rind and juice
4 cups water
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 cups sugar
2 cups good quality tawny port wine
2 jiggers whiskey
2 oranges, sections only
4 grapefruit, sections only
1 bunch of any small seedless grapes, halved
1 cup sliced almonds
2 cups whipping cream, whipped and lighly sweetened
candied ginger cut in bits, to taste

Method:

Soften the gelatin in the 1 1/2 cups of cold water for 5 minutes. Bring 4 cups of water to a boil. Sliver the rinds of the lemons and orange, add to the boiling water along with juices, cinnamon, gelatin mixture and sugar. Stir to dissolve the sugar. Remove from heat, let the mixture steep for 5 minutes. Strain and then add the wine and whiskey. Set this mixture aside to cool to room temperature and then place it in the refrigerator. You want it to begin to get thick. If you add the fruit when it is thin, the fruit will sink to the bottom.

Section the 2 oranges and the 4 grapefruit. Halve the grapes. When the port wine mixture is very thick and syrupy, add the fruit sections, grapes and almonds. Pour into your favorite mold and refrigerate overnight.

Whip the cream, add a little sugar and then dice some candied ginger into the whipped cream. Unmold the gelée, surround it with fruit or holly and serve with the whipped cream.

Cookies For Christmas

♪♪ I'ts beginning to look a lot like Christmas....♪♪

I couldn't resist making these this week....I've been saving the recipe since last year. Such fun. Even unfrosted the chocolate cookies are delicious. Boring looking, but really good. I wasn't certain about the peppermint extract- worried about the amount and that it might be too strong a flavor for the cookies- but it wasn't. Very mild and just the right touch. (Frankly, leaving enough cookies to dip in the white chocolate will be your main problem!)

Are you thinking Girl Scout Mint Cookies here?

So. I thought it might be clever to arrange the cookies and candy the way it was done in the magazine photo. Never had so much fun alone in the kitchen. Choked. Up. With. Laughter. First: take a hammer to the candies. Then: trying to balance uneven peppermint candies in a tall pile is a simply absurd idea. There was even supposed to be one standing upright on top of the tall pile of candies (which in my photo resembles the leaning tower of Pisa). Cute idea to balance the candy on top, but it won't work. Short of using super glue anyway. The pile fell a dozen times before I finally threw in the towel. No doubt the magazine hot-glue-gunned it all together. In the end I licked 'em and hoped they'd stick together. So you are seeing the real thing here- no glue, all imperfections of the amateur (understatement of the week) food designer showing. It was still fun.
The contortions we go through to get decent photos!

Now for a couple practical notes: You can melt your chocolate in the microwave. Carefully. In 20 second increments, stirring after each 20 seconds. Stop before it is completely melted and stir until it's all melted. Then spoon the chocolate over the cookies while they are on a rack...forget the dipping by hand experience. Messy. You may need to give it a quick zap to reheat your chocolate a couple times to keep it as thin as possible-which isn't easy with white chocolate. No real need to cover the bottom of the cookie with the chocolate anyway unless you are an extreme chocoholic OR taking a photograph.

Chocolate Peppermint Cookies
(Adapted from Martha Stewart Living, December 2008)

Ingredients:

1 cup all purpose flour plus more for surface
1/2 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
5 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
3/4 teaspoon pure peppermint extract
8 large candy canes or 30 peppermint candies, crushed
2 pounds white chocolate, coarsely chopped

Method:

Preheat oven to 325°. Sift flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder and salt into a bowl.
Beat butter and sugar with a mixer for 1 minute. Add egg, then yolk, beating well after each addition. Beat in peppermint extract. Slowly add flour mixture and beat just until incorporated. Mold dough into 1 large disk and cut in half. Wrap each in plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm, at least an hour (or up to two days).
Roll out 1 disk on a lightly floured surface to 1/8 inch thickness. Use a 2" cookie cutter to cut out circles and place them on parchment paper. Freeze until firm, at least 15 minutes.
Repeat with remaining disk.

Bake until cookies are dry to the touch, about 12 minutes. Transfer parchment, with cookies, to wire racks and allow to cool. Try not to eat all the cookies at this point. (Undecorated cookies will keep up to 3 days, covered.)

Melt chocolate in a heatproof bowl set over a pot of gently simmering water. Remove from heat and dunk cookies into the melted chocoate. Turn cookies using a fork; let excess drip off and gently scrape the bottom of the cookies against the edge of the bowl. Place on parchment lined baking sheets and sprinkle with the crushed candy.

Refrigerate until set, up to 3 hours. Decorated cookies are best served the same day.