strawberry mousse...thermomixed!

need i say that this is so easy? the most fiddly thing about this is sprinkling the gelatine over the water...

1 1/2 teaspoons gelatine
1/3 cup water
100 grams sugar
250 grams strawberries
300 ml cream

place the water in a bowl and sprinkle the gelatine over the water. place the bowl over hot water to allow the gelatine to swell. stir to dissolve the gelatine and set aside.

place the sugar, strawberries and cream into the thermomix bowl and blend together on speed 8 for 15 seconds. add the gelatine mixture and mix for 5 seconds at speed 5.

pour the mixture into your favourite glasses, ramekins or bowls and refrigerate until set.

su-lynn's lime cheesecakes

this is a great recipe of su-lynn's. you can make them ahead, in fact, you have to, and the are make nice, neat servings.

su-lynn's lime cheesecakes

500 grams cream cheese
1 cup castor sugar
1 cup cream
rind and juice of 1 1/2 limes
butternut cookies

place the butternut cookies at the base of the serving 12 cups.
beat the sugar and lime rind together. this releases the lime oil.
add the cream cheese and beat to combine.
add the cream and beat until smooth.
add the lime juice and beat again.
spoon into the mixture over the butternut cookies.
refrigerate for several hours. this softens the cookies.

lemon posset

lemon posset is something i've bookmarked for a long time. i've actually bookmarked many things for a long time, but this is something that got lucky (at least i hope so). it is simplicity itself. you only need three ingredients: lemons, cream and sugar. there is no baking involved and minimal cooking time.
make this when lemons are in season - that goes without saying. also, make this for those who like lemon desserts - that, also, goes without saying.
i like making small servings and find little espresso coffee cups and chinese teacups a perfect size - just enough to get a lemon hit and crave a little more.

300 mls cream
1/2 cup sugar
100mls lemon juice (about 2 lemons)

place the cream and sugar in a small saucepan and bring to the boil and allow to bubble gently for 3 minutes. stir to disslove the sugar.
remove from the heat, add the lemon juice and stir to mix thoroughly.
pour into your receptacle of choice - i manage between 6 and 8 small serves with the espresso cups.

chocolate ripple cake

i finally had a chance to make this in september for will's birthday. i say finally because we have been meaning to get around to trying out the recipe for years now. sounds silly, doesn't it? you'd think that we would just make it and that would be that. well, it took some time because i didn't want to make it for no reason at all and have to eat it all by myself - in circumstances such as these miss c and miss k are absolutely no help whatsoever. and like i need to eat a whole chocolate ripple cake all by myself and make myself more jiggly than i already am.....ugh....let's get on with the recipe....

1 packet chocolate ripple biscuits (these are a plain chocolate biscuit without a chocolate coating)
600 millilitres thickened cream, whipped, with a little sugar
sherry

dip a biscuit into the sherry and spread with some cream. place on plate. repeat with another biscuit and sandwich the two biscuits and stand them on the plate sideways. repeat with all the biscuits and place the biscuits next to each other on the plate until you get a log. cover the entire log with cream and cover with cling wrap and place in the refrigerator overnight.

i made the one for will's birthday without the sherry and from what i've heard, it was fine. instead of the log, i arranged the biscuits so they resulting cake looked like a round cake with little bits of the biscuits just peeking out from the cream. another way of arranging the biscuits is to curve them around as the log is forming to make a ring cake. the ring cake needs to be made with double quantities of biscuits and cream and looks fabulous with mixed berries overflowing out of the centre.

strawberry mousse

for one reason or another, i have always avoided making mousse. i don't know whether it was the gelatine aspect, the cream whipping aspect, having to use the blender then having to wash it up, or in this case, the use of fresh, luscious berries in a dessert, when i often wonder why people don't just eat the berries just as they are, rather than fiddle with something so perfect. however, now i know why one would make a strawberry mousse - because it is soooo delicious, and oh so easy, especially the way i do it. and what made me take the plunge? it's strawberry season now and perhaps i couldn't justify not making a mousse anymore.

1 punnet (250 grams) strawberries, washed and hulled
1/2 cup sugar
300 mls cream
2 teaspoons gelatine
1/3 cup boiling water

place the gelatine in a small bowl and pour the boiling water over and stir until the gelatine has completely dissolved. set aside while the straberry mixture is being prepared.

place the strawberries, cream and sugar in the beaker of a 1 litre capacity coffee plunger and use a bamix (or other kitchen wand) to blend the contents together. once smooth, pour in the gelatine liquid and blend again.

pour the resulting mousse mixture into 150ml capacity serving glasses or ramekins. the size of your glasses will determine the number of servings you get; i usually get about 5-6 servings and find that this is ideal - any bigger, and one could experience mousse overload, and any less may not be quite satisfying enough.

refrigerate for a couple of hours, or overnight, if time permits. we tend to go through these mousses very quickly (read they are eaten as soon as they set, if not before), however, i did find one behind some other containers in the fridge which was a couple of days old and still very delicious, so i can say they do keep a couple of days quite happily.