I always thought that one of the best things about cooking and tasting your own creation afterwards is the memories that smells, tastes and looks can bring you. Both of my grandmas were fierce when it came to making desserts and they actually both made their own version of the Danish lemon mousse that I will give you the recipe for in this post.
It’s impossible for me to choose which one was my favorite, because they were both very very good, but my own version is closest to the one my grandma Agnes, on my mom’s side, used to make. Each time I take a spoonful of this mouthwateringly yummy dessert, warm memories of her kitchen and her constantly cooking for her family overwhelm me.
Danish lemon mousse (Citronfromage)
Ingredients
4 (or 3) sheets of gelatine or 1 (or less) tbsp gelatine powder. (If you prepare the mousse a day in advance use the lesser amount of gelatine as the mousse will get more stiff if left for a whole day in the fridge.)
3 eggs (I recommend using pasteurized eggs if possible)
100 g/3.5 oz sugar
Zest from 1 organic lemon (finely grated)
1/2 dl/1/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
2 1/2 dl/1 cup whipping cream (35% or 38% fat) + a little extra whipped cream for decoration
Optional: mint leaves or lemon verbena and/or unsalted chopped pistachios for decoration
Directions
1. Start by soaking the gelatine in water for 5 minutes to bloom. If you use sheets of gelatine, the amount of water is not important, but if you use gelatine powder you should use no more than 3 tbsp of water.
2. Whisk together eggs and sugar. Don’t stop whisking until the mixture is pale yellow and fluffy as you want to get some air into the mixture.
3. Now the gelatine needs to be gently heated in a ‘bain Marie’. A bain Marie means that you heat up a saucepan with water to a boil and taken it off the stove. Then you place a heat proof bowl in the heated water and put the gelatine in the bowl to melt. If you use gelatine powder you just heat the mixture as it is. If you use gelatine sheets you take the soaked sheets out of the soaking water and squeeze them to get rid of excess water. Then you heat the gelatine sheets and discard the rest of the soaking water. Once the gelatine turns into a smooth liquid, mix it with the lemon zest and juice.
4. Now pour the gelatine/lemon liquid into the fluffy eggs. Be sure to whisk well while pouring in the lemon mixture so you get a smooth creamy mixture. You do not want any gelatine lumps!
5. In another bowl you whip the cream until it’s almost stiff. Then gently mix the whipped cream with the eggs/lemon/gelatine cream, almost folding the two into each other, so that you preserve the fluffiness of the mixtures.
6. Now pour the mousse into whatever serving dish or dishes you like. It can be one large one or smaller ones for individual servings, whatever you prefer.
7. Then leave the mousse to set in the refrigerator for at least 3 hours. Before you serve the mousse, decorate with a bit of whipped cream, maybe some mint leaf or lemon verbena and a little chopped unsalted pistachio nuts.
Enjoy!
