Chocolate Mousse Pie

I’ll start today’s pie post with a disclaimer:

I know that not everyone has leftover chocolate in their house.

I know that “leftover chocolate” is indeed, an oxymoron in some houses and to be honest in this household that’s usually exactly what it is. “Leftover” and “chocolate”  are completely contradictory terms that in no way, shape, or form should go together.

 Like “housecleaning” and “Magpie”.

Or ” Airline Food”.

These are things that just don’t mesh well.

However, at holiday times in this household, something just crazy happens. Some magical, forgetful fairy sprinkles her dust over my children’s heads while they sleep and they forget about the candy that we dole out in small portions after the Easter Bunny or Halloween Bat load them up. I then have the conundrum of leftover chocolate.

This rare bi-annual occurrence spurred me to bake a pie this week using my children’s leftover Easter chocolate that has been in the cupboard, lonely and forgotten.

This is so easy there should never, ever, EVER be a reason you are EVER tempted to bake a pie using chocolate pudding. Rarely do I turn my nose up at ingredients, hey, we are all a busy lot of mamas and bakers, but chocolate pudding makes my gag reflex act right up. Gets right up in my grill and nasty with me.

I think that everyone should have a basic knowledge of how to whip together a chocolate mousse.

Don’t fear the mousse. This Chocolate Mousse Pie is to die for.

It’s very easy, very forgiving, very adaptable and there are so many ways to do it. This is by far the easiest, using whipped cream instead of egg whites to fold in, giving it that lift we are looking for in mousse.

Chocolate Mousse Pie Ingredients

Filling:

• 1/3 cup whipping cream
• 8 oz chocolate of choice
• 2 egg yolks
• 1 1/2 cups of whipping cream – to fold in later

Topping:

• 3/4 cup of whipping cream
• 1 tsp sugar
• shaved chocolate bits, if desired

Crust:

• 2 cups of graham wafers or cookie crumbs of your choice
• 1/3 cup & 2 tbsp melted butter

How to Make Chocolate Mousse Pie

Prepare your pie crust by combining the crumbs and butter, then pressing into a 9.5-inch pie plate, covering the sides and bottom evenly. Bake at 350 for 10 minutes then cool.

 You probably thought I was kidding about the leftover chocolate, weren’t you? That would be 8 oz -measured with my kitchen scale- of leftover foil-wrapped Easter eggs. Sans the foil, of course.

Melt your chocolate and whipping cream together in a thick pot on the stove over medium-low heat. Adding the whipped cream makes this slightly more like a ganache but when using chocolate that isn’t the greatest quality, it’s important that we make sure we have fats and milk solids in here so that the chemistry works properly. I knew I couldn’t depend on this chocolate to be of good quality, so added in the cream. Plus let’s face it, is fatty fat whipping cream going to ruin it? Nu-uh.

Once that is melted together, beat your egg yolks until creamy colored, then whisk into the chocolate mixture as fast as you can, making sure there are no lumps and it doesn’t cook in clumps. Make sure it doesn’t boil!

Cook this mixture further for another 5-7 minutes, it will thicken up slightly.

Remove from the heat and let it cool.

When the chocolate mixture is cooled completely, whip up the next 1 1/2 cups of whipping cream. I did not add any sugar knowing that my Easter egg chocolate was very sweet. I wouldn’t add any, the whipping cream cuts the sweetness making the pie actually more palatable and guests partaking in this pie most likely won’t go into a sugar coma.

Most likely.

Fold the whipping cream into the cooled mixture completely. Cool the pie for 4-5 hours, until it’s set.

I really like the plastic wrap pattern on the top. It really works.

When you serve it, you can use as much whipped cream as you want for topping, I chose a very thin layer using only 3/4 of a cup. I did add sugar to this, just a small amount. You can decide the amount you’d like and if you want to top it with chocolate shavings or not.

Now I know that Mr. Magpie always likes each pie better than the last, but he’s in love with this one. He loved – shudder- chocolate pudding pies in a graham wafer crust as a kid so he was in seventh heaven. I was truly glad to awaken his taste buds to the next level of chocolate pie but may have created a monster now.

When I went to the fridge today to get a piece to photograph – totally last minute this is what I found on the pie:

Most people would be freaked out by a random note on their pie, saying Sorry, I couldn’t resist. It was yummy.

Really ups the creep factor of someone else being in your house.

Eating your pie out of your fridge and leaving notes.

Luckily my heart stopped beating out of my chest when I remembered my sister had popped in earlier when I was out.

This is why you never, ever, give your family keys to your house and garage codes.

Because it’s still creepy, even though they are family.

I think I’m going to give her the nickname Pie Burglar.  PB, for short.

I like it.

She’s totally going to hate it.

And the true sister I am, that makes me love it even more.

Now that was a rather short babble, wasn’t it? You’re probably thinking one of two things at this moment.

1. Thank God she stopped blathering on PieDay and just wrote the recipe post. About time.

2. WTH Magpie, where’s your story? The running off at the mouth beak? 

Well, #1’ers, of course I have to keep going, I just mixed up the order to throw you off.

Today…oh today has been a flurry of activity.

Two hours cleaning the house.

Lunch at Zinc at the Alberta Art Gallery. We – Mr. Magpie and I – were jonesing for their burger. Lawd Almighty, I love the cheese bun that Chef Omar uses on it. And peppers and mushrooms? Just a beaut, I tell you. A beaut.

Edmonton chefs are spoiling Mr Magpie far, far too much when we are eating out it seems, almost every time we are out, he’s comparing their cooking to mine. (Oh, Mr. Magpie, what a fatal mistake this is. Ask any wife)

Today’s conversation went like this.

Mr. Magpie turns to the server and asks: ” What are these green things in my salad? They are amazing!”

Server: “Pickled Capers.”

Mr Magpie: “They are fantastic!”

Mr Magpie turns to Mrs Magpie -who by the way, just wants to eat a dang burger- and asks: “Why don’t you ever use these?”

Mrs. Magpie, thoroughly annoyed, speaks through a mouth full of burgers: ” I do, I use them in my chicken piccata.”

Mr. Magpie” Well, they sure don’t taste like this.”

I’ve readied the couch for him.

Other than preparing the couch for Mr. Magpie, I had to hurry up and photograph the pie for this post.

This afternoon.

This is what my table looked like, trying to grab a quick picture while the measly, stingy, rainy daylight was out.

Tonight is a school dance for my kids which is going to top off an incredibly crazy day. Pizza lunch at school, followed by an afternoon field trip to see a play, followed by piano/voice lessons right after school, topped off with a dance going until 8:30.

Anyone who’s a parent is shaking their head right now. You see the meltdowns forthcoming, don’t you?

It may be tears at the end of the dance when it’s time to go.

It could be tears in the van on the way home.

It most likely will be one sibling hitting the other. I’m laying bets on this one.  Let’s play Clue for one moment here.

I say:  ” The daughter, hitting the son,  with her hand, in the minivan, on the way home from the dance tonight”

Oy. I’m thinking a small, discreet flask of wine for the dance might be in order.

Love,

Colonel Mustard Magpie

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