Mango Chocolate Mousse Cake and Macaron

First of all, I want to apologize for yet another mango cake in this blog. It was only two weeks ago that you saw some yellow cheesecake but here I am presenting you with another one. I hope you'll bear with my mango madness for a bit.

Strangely, California has been under a lot of clouds lately, very unusual in Summer. The temperature dropped to mid 70's and it is breezy in the morning and at night, but it's all perfect in the afternoon. I always try to sneak in some walk around the office building around 4pm when I have the time, just to enjoy the sun.

Anyways, it was yet another birthday for my coworker in the same team. I didn't know what he likes, I just assume or more like forcing myself to believe that he likes anything just because so that I could make whatever I want :). I was still curious a lot about mango and chocolate combination, I made it a few times in macaron, cheesecake and brownies, etc, but it always seems like the mango flavor is easily lost in the midst of chocolate, chocolate overpowers almost everything basically. So, I was determined to once again, try this combo with mostly mango mousse and a layer of chocolate mousse in between, hoping that this time, mango will rule.

It just seemed like a perfect idea and combination when I pictured the cake. I imagined a perfect layering, with a little crunch in the middle, and definitely chocolate macaron decoration, secretly hoping that my coworker is not allergic to one of them.

This cake has quite a few components, it has two layers of chocolate sponge, mango mousse, chocolate mousse, a thin layer of feuilletine, clear glaze, and of course the macarons. The macarons are filled with mango buttercream, except the side decoration. It took quite a bit of time to make each one but once you've got it all, it's relatively easy to assemble. I took a shortcut and used my last batch of instant chocolate mousse though, it was Alaska-Express chocolate mousse mix just because I have enough leftover to make one 8" layer (will have to make it from scratch next time), everything else was pretty straight forward too.

I finally ordered some pectin NH online and I made my glaze using that. In the past, I used just regular pectin that I get from the grocery store, but I could never get the consistency I wanted. The resulted glaze was so runny at first even after refrigerating it overnight, thinking that I should have put more pectin, but after longer refrigeration, it thicken beautifully, just perfect consistency.

The cake was definitely a hit when I brought the cake in the office, it's very light, refreshing without being too heavy and definitely far from too sweet :)

The cross-section picture above was taken with my point-and-shoot camera, not very good quality, but just to give you guys an idea of how the inside looks like, it wasn't a clean cut either but it works :).

You know, I should really restrain myself from buying fruits all the time. I can't resist in buying lots and lots of gorgeous cherries, peaches, nectarines, apricots, mangoes, but then I'm left with all these wonderful fruits without knowing how do I have the time to play with them. I have so many varieties of fruits that I'm confused of what to make. I just finished making some healthy and tasty fruit smoothie with peach, raspberry, blueberry, and some mango, yumm... Fruit crumble using all the different summer fruits might be in the menu a few weeks from now if I ever managed to squeeze some time to make a vanilla bean ice cream. I haven't been playing too much with raspberry this year, knowing that I still have a few months to go, but not for the stone fruits, their season will be over before you know it. I already have some list of raspberry dessert I want to make, hmm cannot wait. In the next few weeks, you will find me busy buying and freezing each one of them though, for my winter stash this year. Oh how I wish they would be available all year long.

Verity Joy Rediawan

On a side note, I'm officially an aunty of 13! Remember this baby shower? Yup, I have 13 nieces and nephews now, and the 13th was just born a few days ago and I am officially in love with her. This cake was actually made right before the baby was born. Can't wait to see her grows up and feed her cakes to maintain those chubby cheeks :)