This delicious dessert began as a Gâteau Concorde project with my baking group, Bakers Dozen San Francisco, and a recipe demo from Gesine Bullock-Prado, author of the sweet memoir, My Life from Scratch. Instead of following the instructions, I decided instead to experiment on my own with two techniques:
- dacquoise (a meringue “cake” layer made from egg whites and ground nuts; used to make a layered dessert of the same name)
- chocolate mousse using the pâte à bombe technique which cooks the egg yolks (I used L’École Valrhona’s video as reference)
For the meringue, I turned to my favorite recipe, Overnight Meringues, and added Valrhona cocoa powder and hazelnut flour. I hoped the overnight bake would still work with those additions, and it did—hooray! (The overnight bake of meringues makes me so happy.)
For the chocolate mousse, I wanted to learn a technique that would remove the small risk of uncooked eggs; traditional French chocolate mouse uses uncooked egg yolks. Gesine mentioned the pâte à bombe technique in her recipe so I set out to learn more, ended up on the Valrhona site, and fell in love with the simple process—heat and beat!
Overnight Hazelnut Dacquoise
makes 3 6-inch rounds
Ingredients
- 4 egg whites
- 1 cup granulated sugar 200 grams
- 1 pinch Kosher salt
- ½ cup hazelnut flour 50 grams
- ¼ cup Valrhona cocoa powder, unsweetened, Dutch-process 25 grams
Instructions
-
Preheat oven to 300°F. Get out two sheet pans and line with baking parchment. Using a pencil and a 6-inch diameter bowl or ruler, trace 3 6-inch circles on the papers—2 on one sheet, 1 on the other. Return parchment to pans, pencil-side down.
Add a couple inches of water to a saucepan and bring to a boil on the stovetop. Once boiling, lower heat to simmer. This will serve as a double-boiler for the next step.
-
Add egg whites, sugar, and pinch salt to the metal bowl of an electric mixer and whisk by hand to combine. Using a hotpad to protect your hand, hold this bowl over the saucepan of water, whisking until sugar dissolves and the mixture is quite warm, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat, dry outside of the bowl, place in the stand mixer with whisk attachment, and whisk on high for 15 minutes, until mixture is cool and billowy.
-
Sprinkle the hazelnut flour and cocoa over the meringue and using a large spatula, gently fold to combine.
Transfer meringue to a piping bag fitted with a plain ½-inch diameter tip (Ateco 806). Pipe spirals to fill the 3 circles traced on parchment. Pipe any remaining meringue into small kisses or sticks. Place pans in preheated oven, turn off heat, and the dacquoise will be perfectly baked and dried out by morning.
Chocolate Mousse using Pâte à Bombe
makes filling for 3-layer, 6-inch diameter dacquoise
Ingredients
- 4 large egg yolks
- 1 large egg
- 1 cup less 2 tablespoons granulated sugar 180 grams
- ½ cup water 120 grams
- 4 ounces Guittard 70% bittersweet chocolate baking bars, chopped
- 2 cups heavy cream, divided
Additional cocoa powder for sprinkling
Instructions
-
Add a couple inches of water to a saucepan and bring to a boil on the stovetop, this will serve as your bain marie, water bath. Once boiling, lower heat to simmer.
Add egg yolks, whole egg, sugar, and water to the metal bowl of an electric mixer and whisk by hand to combine. Using a hotpad to protect your hand, hold this bowl over the saucepan of water, whisking until mixture hits 185º F.
Remove from heat, dry outside of the bowl, place in the stand mixer with whisk attachment, and whisk on high for 15 minutes, until mixture is cool and billowy. Transfer mixture to a bowl and set aside as you'll use the whisk and mixing bowl to whip cream next.
-
Pour 1½ cups heavy cream into mixer and whip until firm peaks. Place in refrigerator while you prepare the chocolate.
-
Place chopped chocolate and ½ cup heavy cream in a small bowl. Set this in a shallow pan of barely simmering water until melted. Remove from water and allow to cool slightly.
-
Fold the chocolate into the pâte à bombe (egg yolks) then fold in the chilled whipped cream. Transfer to a piping bag fitted with a star tip (Ateco 826 or what you like) and pipe spirals atop baked Overnight Hazelnut Dacquoise layers, ending with chocolate mousse on top.
Sprinkle with additional cocoa powder and/or confectioners sugar. Crush extra bits of baked dacquoise, and sprinkle on top.
Chill for at least 3 hours or overnight.
