What’s cooking in Brazil?
Passion fruit mousse
When I asked my Brazilian neighbor Monica what was cooking in Brazil, she suggested for us to cook a Passion Fruit Mousse together for dessert!
Monica lives in Switzerland and her ties to Switzerland have always been strong as her father was a Swiss from Interlaken who had moved to Brazil. She has always lived in Rio de Janeiro, until 14 years ago, when she and her husband decided to move to Switzerland. She does miss the Brazilian food and, in the beginning, she had to go to a lot of different shops around the city to find her ingredients, but now, more and more becomes available everywhere and Monica often meets up with some Brazilian friends to cook together.
Passion fruit mousse is an easy to make, yet exotic dessert. Before we made this I actually only knew the dark colored passion fruits, but for this recipe I would need the yellow one, which is also called ‘Maracujá’. The Maracuyá fruit grows in Brazil, and can also be found in Colombia, Paraguay and Argentina. It is traditionally used in fruit juices and desserts. If the fruit is still a bit green, it’s taste will still be a bit acid, but when it is starting to wrinkle, it will be sweet.
Cooking time: approximately 20 minutes, 2 hours in the fridge
Ingredients:
– 3 yellow Passion fruits, 2 to make a fruit juice for the mousse, and 1 for the decoration on top
– 200 gr of sour cream
– small can of condensed milk (the Nestlé one for instance contains 380gr)
– 2 sheets of gelatin
How to prepare:
- Cut the 2 passion fruits in half and put the inside of the 2 fruits in the mixer
- Add approximately 40 ml of water, mix a little bit, but not too much so that the grains won’t break up
- You then pour your fruit juice through a sieve, into a bowl, to separate the seeds and the juice. You will have to stir in the sieve with a spoon a bit, because sometimes the juice still stays a bit attached to the seeds.
- Empty the can of condensed milk in a bowl, and keep the can for measuring quantity later on
- Put the sour cream in the bowl with the condensed milk (or directly in your mixer if you have one big enough)
- Warm up a small bowl with a bit of water in the microwave, take it out and put the 2 sheets of gelatin in. Only approximately 50ml of water!
- Once the gelatin sheets are completely absorbed in the water, you pour it to a height of approximately two fingers into the empty condensed milk can. You then add the fruit juice to fill up the can and stir a bit.
- Empty this in your bowl, or mixer, with the sour cream and the condensed milk and mix it.
- You can then pour this into your dessert bowls.
- Open up one more passion fruit and scrape the inside a bit loose with a spoon. You then top the desserts with the fruit for decoration.
- Children sometimes don’t like to eat the seeds, and Monica says she then puts a bit of chocolate chips on it for decoration.
- The dessert has to stay in the fridge for at least 2 hours.
While we are cooking, Monica tells me you can also make a nice cocktail with this passion fruit, called Batida de Maracujá.
You can make a bottle of this cocktail and keep it for 3-4 days in the fridge.
To make this cocktail, you will need to make the fruit juice of 2 Maracujá’s as in the above recipe (mix and pour it through the sieve). You add 1 can of condensed milk and Rum. Add some ice in the glasses before serving this cocktail. According to Monica this cocktail is often served on the beach in Brazil, and the sweet flavor sometimes makes people forget that there is alcohol in it, so don’t forget that 😊.
Enjoy!
