Chocolate Mousse & Orange Blossom Tart

What could be a more appropriate pie for an easter baking competition at work then chocolate. I thought a dense dark chocolate mousse would go deliciously with tangy marmalade and fragrant orange blossom water. The judges must have agreed as they gave it first place!

Ingredients

1x Pie Shell, I used 21cm

2-3 Tbs Orange Marmalade

300g Dark Chocolate

3 Eggs, separated

pinch Salt
1/2 tsp Orange Blossom Water

100g Dark Chocolate, coarsely grated

Bake pie shell for 15min at 180C until golden, while warm spread marmalade over pie base.
Melt 300g chocolate over bain marie until 80% melted, remove from heat and stir until all melted.
Whip egg whites until soft peaks form, add salt and whip until smooth and glossy with stiff peaks.
Add a scoop of egg whites to the melted chocolate and fold in.
Add the egg yolks to the melted chocolate.
Continue folding the egg whites into the melted chocolate until all gone.
Add the orange blossom water to the mix.Cool, then add the grated chocolate.
Pour into pie shell and refrigerate overnight to set.

Easter Bunny Pie with Walnut Pastry

My other entry into the work Easter Cooking competition, I thought cooking the easter bunny would be very tasty, if not a bit sad that there would be less chocolate going around.

1x Wild Rabbit, chopped into four pieces
2x med Onions, diced
220g smokey Bacon, diced into 2.5cm pieces
2x Apples, peeled and sliced
275ml Cider
425ml Chicken Stock

1 Bay Leaf

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40g Flour
40g Butter
Salt and Pepper
1/2 whole Nutmeg, grated

110g Prunes, pitted and chopped
Caraway seeds to sprinkle on top

Place the rabbit pieces, onions, bacon, apples, cider, chicken stock, salt and pepper and bay leaf into the crockpot, cook on low for 8 hours or overnight.
When cool remove bones from rabbit.
Drain liquid from crockpot into a pot and heat gently on stovetop.
Melt the butter in a saucepan, add the flour and cook for a minute.

Add the liquid and bring to the boil to thicken.
When thick turn off heat; add nutmeg, prunes and rabbit mix. Season to taste.
Pour mix into lined pie shell, top with walnut pastry and caraway seeds.
Bake for 30min at 220C

Pastry
300g Flour
1/2 tsp Salt
200g cold Butter, cubed
1/2 cup Walnuts, finely chopped
4-6 Tbs cold Water

Sift flour and salt into a bowl and rub in the cold butter until the mix resembles fine breadcrumbs.
Stir in the chopped walnuts.
Make a well in the centre, add the cold water and mix to form a dough.
Wrap in plastic wrap and chill for 30min.
Take 2/3 of dough and roll out to line 25cm diameter, 5cm deep pie dish.

Chocolate, Banana Meringue Pie

A twist on the traditional banoffee pie, my love of chocolate combined with banana's, strawberries and topped with luscious meringue.

1x Pie Shell
100g Cream
200g dark Chocolate, broken into pieces.
2x Bananas, sliced
1 handful of Strawberries, sliced
Cinnamon
Brown Sugar
4x Egg whites
4 Tbs Sugar

Heat cream and pour over chocolate in a bowl, stir until chocolate is melted, cool.
Whip chocolate ganache until light, spread in pie shell.
Place sliced banana and strawberries on chocolate ganache, sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon.
Whip egg whites and sugar until stiff peaks, spread over pie.
Bake for 10min at 220C or until meringue is golden.

Lemon and Sugar Crepe Pie

Page 3 in the pie idea notebook. I love crepes with lemon and sugar, so the challenge of making a pie version of that was a pleasure! This may seem like a lot of effort, but it did not take long at all, I made it during one of my weeks where I am out every night, one step at a time. The crepes can be made a day or so ahead, the pie dish can be lined with pastry and frozen a week before hand. Then all that remains is making the filling and assembling the pie.

Crepe Pie

1x Pie shell, in cake tin or deep pie dish
9x Crepes
4 Tbs Caster Sugar
3 Eggs, Seperated
3 Tbs Lemon Curd
zest 1 Lemon, keep lemon for juice
250g Mascarpone

Bake pie shell for 15min at 180C, let cool.
Beat egg whites until soft peaks form, add sugar and beat until stiff.
In a separate bowl beat mascarpone until light and creamy, beat in egg yolks, lemon curd and zest.
Fold egg whites into mascarpone mix 1/3 at a time. Chill for 30min before using.
Spread a layer of mousse into base of pie shell, top with a crepe and a squeeze of lemon.
Repeat layers of mousse, crepes and lemon juice until all used up, or top of pie shell is reached.
Finish with a crepe (I leave the best looking one for the top) and sprinkle with demarera sugar, caramelize sugar with a blow torch or with a spoon (heat a large metal spoon over a gas flame and run the back of the spoon over the sugar. Be careful, the spoon can get very hot)
Leave in the fridge to set, at least a few hours, overnight works well.

I made this without the squeeze of lemon between the layers and felt that it needed a little more tart lemon flavour.

Crepes

2 C Standard Flour
2 Eggs
2 C Milk
1 tsp Cinnamon (Feel free to adjust to taste, ditto with vanilla)
1 tsp Vanilla Essence
1 Tbs Sugar
Extra milk

If making these for crepe pie aim to use a pan that will give you crepes to snugly fit the diameter of the pie shell, excess pieces can be trimmed.

Mix all ingredients together, it will need extra milk to make a thin batter (appx 1/4-1/2 cup)
Heat a pan and melt a small slice of butter before adding crepe batter and swirling around to fill pan.
Should make about 12 crepes, these can be kept for a few days or frozen.

Tropical Pie

A fruity little number that is refreshing on a light summers evening.

1x Pie Shell
3Tbs Passionfruit Curd
2 cups Fruit, chopped (Plums, Nectarines, Berries, Peaches, Bananas, Melon)
4x Egg Whites
2 Tbs Sugar
1/2 cup coconut, thread

Mix fruit with passionfruit curd, spread in pre-baked pie shell.
Whip egg whites with sugar until stiff peaks form, fold in coconut thread.
Spread onto pie and bake for 10min at 200C or until golden.