Jean-Margret from Blanchardville, WI (2017 Week 7: Desserts)

Baker

Jean-Margret

Location

Blanchardville, WI

Baking Challenge

Mini Mousse Cakes

Give your dessert a clever name – and tell us about your recipe.

I scoured my recipe books, the internet, and clippings and finally decided on a genoise base for a strawberry-blackberry mousse and a hickory nut cake base for a lemon mousse.

What was the biggest surprise during your baking journey? Did you use any unconventional approaches? What did you learn along the way? Tell us about it!

This took forever – I would never be able to get it done in 4 hours – the mousse needs lots of chilling time. I had to make little parchment paper collars for each mini-cake to hold the mousse while it chilled. It reminded me that when I’ve seen these in patisseries, they have cellophane collars.

How did you add a Wisconsin twist to your flavors or decoration?

I used strawberries (frozen) and the first blackberries both from our garden. The hickory nuts were collected locally also. Then I decorated the lemon mousse with the Wisconsin state flower – viola’s – a fact I learned last week!

How did you do?

Absolutely lovely.