Gianduia Mousse

When a classic French dessert marries a beloved Italian confection, you get gianduia mousse.
Don't be afraid of pronouncing it.
 Just say "ghan-do-ya", with a soft "g". Then say:

Gianduia is an ethereal combination of ground hazelnuts and chocolate. You probably know it as Nutella.

(ALERT: World Nutella Day is coming up fast - February 5. Stay tuned!)

Rather than using Nutella straight from the jar, this recipe has you making your own hazelnut paste. You can do it - it's easy! So is the rest of this recipe.

The mousse was the sweet ending to our cooking group's Italian feast last Sunday. 

So before we got to dessert, we sampled swiss chard crostata, focaccia, ravioli with pear and pecorino, chicken saltimbocca, roasted green beams with pine nuts and lemon and a lovely tri-colore salad with frico. Whew.

Even after all that, it was hard to resist the mousse.

Gianduia Mousse

from Fine Cooking Real Italian

First, make the hazelnut butter. It can be made in advance and refrigerated in a sealed container for up to three months. Bring to room temperature before using.

You'll need

8 oz. hazelnuts (1 2/3 cups), toasted and skinned

1/4 cup vegetable oil

To toast and skin the hazelnuts, heat the oven to 350. Spread the nuts in a single layer on a baking sheet. Toast in oven until the skins are mostly split and the nuts are light golden brown and fragrant, 15-18 minutes. Watch carefully!

Put the warm hazelnuts in a clean dishtowel. Fold the towel around the hazelnuts and let them steam for at least 5 minutes. Then rub the nuts inside the towel to remove most of the skins. Don't worry if you don't get it all. Even if you just get half off, it'll be fine. Let the nuts cool completely.

Put the nuts in a food processor, add the oil and pulse a few times. Process, checking the consistency every few seconds, until the mixture looks like natural peanut butter (creamy but slightly grainy) or wet sand. It should take a minute or two.

For the mousse, you'll need

6 oz. bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, finely chopped

1 1/2 cups heavy cream

2/3 cup hazelnut butter

2 tsp. vanilla extract

In a 2-quart metal bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water, melt the chocolate, stirring with a rubber spatula until the chocolate is completely smooth. In a separate small sauce pan, heat 1/2 cup of the cream to just below the boiling point. Remove the bowl of chocolate form the pan of water, wiping the bottom and sides dry if necessary. Pour the hot cream into the melted chocolate and stir together until well-blended. Add the hazelnut butter and combine well, then add vanilla.

In a chilled mixing bowl, using chilled beaters, beat the remaining one cup cream until it holds soft peaks. Using a rubber spatula, fold the whipped cream into the chocolate mixture in four batches, blending thoroughly after each addition.

Pour the mousse into a 1 1/2 quart souffle dish or serving bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until set, at least 2 hours.

For the garnish, beat  1/2 cup heavy cream until frothy. Add 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract and continue beating until the cream holds soft peaks. Garnish individual servings of the mousse with the whipped cream, and some chopped hazelnuts.

Gianduja Stracciatella Gelato

Say "jyan-do-ah stra-cha-te-la".

That's a mouthful, isn't it?

And oh what a mouthful it is!
Creamy nutty cold smoothness punctuated with streaks of bittersweet chocolate.
As they say in Italy, squisito.

I made this incredible gelato yesterday, using a recipe from my most recent cookbook purchase, The Perfect Scoop by David Lebovitz. David, a former pastry chef, has an enviable life in Paris - baking, cooking, blogging, writing, eating. Can't think of much that's better than that!

It was a steamy day and I craved something sweet and chilly. A popsicle just wasn't going to do it.
Looking through the book, there were so many choices, but this one caught my eye. It sounded a lot like Nutella, which as you know, is a favorite in our house.

You will need an ice cream maker of course. I've been using this Cuisinart model for years. It's inexpensive and so easy even a child can do it. ( I have often encouraged this, but she hasn't taken the hint yet.)

Making this gelato is a bit more complicated than your average ice cream recipe. There's quite a few saucepans involved, a couple of bowls, more than one strainer, toasting of nuts and some waiting time.
But I promise you, it's worth it!

Be sure to use the good stuff.
The best chocolate you can find (I used Black & Green, plus Scharffen Berger) and real dairy cream (try to find something local that hasn't had thickeners added).

The coolest ( and most delizioso) thing about this is the straciatella, which are the streaks of chocolate. It's the idea of chocolate chips but in a sophisticated Italian style. I'd had them before in vanilla gelato, but I never knew how it was made. Actually it's the simplest part of the recipe. See below for instructions.

Gianduja Gelato with stracciatella,

adapted from The Perfect Scoop by David Lebovitz

1 1/2 cups hazelnuts, toasted and skinned (see note)

1 cup whole milk

2 cups heavy cream

3/4 cup sugar

1/4 tsp. sea salt, or other coarse salt

4 oz. milk chocolate, finely chopped

5 large egg yolks

Place toasted, skinned hazelnuts in a food processor and finely chop.

In a saucepan, warm the milk with 1 cup of the cream, sugar and salt. Once warm, remove from the heat and add chopped hazelnuts to the saucepan. Cover, and let sit for an hour at room temperature.

Put the milk chocolate pieces in a large bowl. In another saucepan, heat the remaining cup of cream just until it boils. Pour the cream over the milk chocolate and stir until it's completely melted and smooth. Set a mesh strainer over the top then place the bowl in a larger bowl filled with ice and cold water.

Pour the hazelnut-infused mixture through a strainer into a medium saucepan, pressing on the nuts firmly, making sure to extract as much of the liquid as you can. Discard the hazelnuts.

Rewarm this mixture gently. (How do you know when it's just warm? Stick your finger in it.)

In a separate medium bowl, whisk the egg yolks together. Slowly pour the warm hazelnut-milk mixture into the egg yolks, then scrape the whole thing back into the saucepan.

Place the saucepan on medium heat and stir constantly with a heatproof spatula, scraping the bottom as you stir, until the mixture thickens enough to coat the spatula.

Now, pour the custard through the strainer that's placed over the milk chocolate and stir it in until well-combined and cooled. (I had to press on it quite a bit with the spatula to help it through the strainer.)

Chill the mixture thoroughly in your refrigerator, then freeze it in your ice cream maker according to manufacturer's instructions.

To make the stracciatella, melt 5 oz. finely chopped semisweet or bittersweet chocolate in a bowl set in a saucepan of simmering water (or a double boiler). Stir until it is completely smooth.

To add it to the gelato, drizzle the warm chocolate in a very thin stream directly into the ice cream maker, while it is still running, but just at the very last moment before it is done. You'll be able to see it harden into chocolate streaks.

You may want to eat it all at this very moment.

Go ahead, at least lick the dasher.

But put the rest in a plastic container and freeze for at least an hour or so.

If you can.

Note: To toast hazelnuts, preheat oven to 350. Spread the nuts in an even layer on a baking sheet.

Bake the nuts for 10-15 minutes, stirring them once or twice while baking so they toast evenly. Let them cool completely before using in a recipe.

To skin the hazelnuts, rub them, while still warm, inside a clean dishtowel. This will remove much of the papery skin. Don't worry about getting it all off.