Mango Chocolate Mousse Cake

This is the second cake I made for my Mom's birthday. At a German birthday party you usually can not have too many cakes. So, she even made another one herself. I wanted to make a mango-chocolate cake since I ate one in Vienna last year.

I made a decorative joconde to wrap around the cake, but I think next time I would do it without. The whole cake got a little bigger than I wanted it to be. It was really huge.

The cake still tasted delicious. I especially liked the chocolate mousse. I don't know if it was the use of the immersion blender, but it had a really nice consistency. Instead of the mango mousse, which was also very good, I want to try a passion fruit mousse next time. I think the tartness of passion fruit would go very well together with the chocolate mousse.

It takes some time and several steps to make this cake. Plan accordingly, since you have a few cooling cycles. I would recommend you bake the joconde (if using) and sponge the day before, and also make the chocolate mousse. Then you can start to assemble the cake. This way it has enough time to set overnight. The next day, when you serve the cake you have just the mango mousse and glaze to make.

Mango - Plum Wine Cakes and a Happy Chinese New Year!

Today is the beginning of the Chinese year of the Dragon. It is supposedly a very good year, since the dragon is seen as strong and lucky. I always enjoyed the Chinese New Year's Parade in San Francisco or Vancouver and this year it is probably extra beautiful with lots of colorful dragons.

For the occasion I made some Asian flavor inspired cakes. We had them for our Chinese New Year's Eve dinner. They have a crunchy layer of milk chocolate and Rice Krispies. In the middle a creamy plum-wine mousse, topped with a mango glaze. The different flavors worked really well together and we enjoyed them very much.

I wish you all a very prosperous year of the Dragon. Gung hay fat choy!