The Friday Baking Project
Chocolate Mousse Torte

PRINT

Yield: One 9†pie pan

# of Servings:  8 to 10

Ingredients
8 oz chocolate
1 tsp instant coffee (optional)
¼ cup boiling water²

8 egg yolks
â…“ cup sugar (2.4 oz / 68 g)
1 tsp vanilla extract

8 egg whites 
Pinch salt
â…“ cup sugar (2.4 oz / 68 g) 

1 ½ cups heavy cream 
¼ cup confectioners’ sugar, sifted
1 tsp vanilla extract

Chocolate wafer crumbs, as needed (see note 1) 

Special equipment needed: 

• One 9†by 1.25†pie plate

Pre-recipe preparations:

• Butter a 9†by 1.25†pie plate, and dust with chocolate wafer crumbs. 
• Preheat oven to 350 °F

Directions

1. Place chocolate in a large mixing bowl. Dissolve the coffee in boiling water and add to chocolate.
2. Melt in a microwave or over a double boiler. Set aside.
3. In machine bowl, using wire whip beat the egg yolks, vanilla, and sugar for approximately 5 minutes, or until very thick and light lemon colored.
4. Add to the chocolate, and stir until well-blended. 
5. In a clean mixing bowl, beat the whites with the salt until soft peaks.  
6. Slowly add the sugar and beat to just stiff meringue.
7. Stir ¼ of the whites into the chocolate mixture to lighten, then fold in remainder just until whites are blended in.
8. Set aside 5 cups (16 .2 oz / 459 g) of the mousse and refrigerate. 
9. Gently pour the remainder of the mousse into the pie plate and level w/o deflating the mousse. 
10. Bake until just firm and a cake tester reveals only a few moist crumbs, between 14 and 15 minutes.  Remove from oven and let cool on a rack. 
11. When cool, gently spread the remaining mousse into the center of the baked mousse in the pie plate. 
12. Place in refrigerator for at least 3 hours. 
13. Whip the cream with the sugar and vanilla just until firm peaks. Pipe or spread over the top. Sprinkle with chocolate shavings or dust with cocoa powder.

Notes:

¹  Nabisco Famous Chocolate Wafers used to be the default cookie for chocolate crumbs. However, Nabisco has stopped making them. Two alternatives are Goya Chocolate Maria cookies, and Oreo Thins. The Goya cookies are a crisp, simple wafers that work well as crumbs. However, they are a lighter color than the old Famous Chocolate Wafers, which were almost black. 

Crumbs made from Oreo thins will most closely resemble the Famous Chocolate Wafers in color and taste, especially if the cookies are twisted open and the white filling is scraped out.  

² The water is necessary even if you don’t use the coffee