Baking Fail: How NOT to Make Mousse

I've made a lot of mistakes on this baking adventure but not so much where I sacrificed 50 cupcakes...

I was so excited to make chocolate cupcakes with chocolate chip mousse filling for a birthday party and thought I had it in the bag. I had my heavy cream, some powdered sugar and I used mostly hot chocolate packets to sweeten and give it a hint of milk chocolate flavor. Who doesn't love hot chocolate?

It came out beautiful. I had a huge geek moment. After all, not many people get excited over the fluffiness of homemade mousse. I was proud!

The picture doesn't really do it justice, but you get the point. 

I couldn't just leave it at that. Nope, I had to be gutsy which in turn became my downfall. I chopped up milk chocolate and white chocolate chips that I wanted to add to it. Well, they're kind of heavy and I got a little overboard and while it still tasted delicious, it flattened the mousse. And my spirit. 

It became a soupy mess and I was more upset than I should of been but hey, now I know. Ease up on the chips and fold them in instead of tossing them into the mixer. 

I tried baking them in the center anyway and it was a complete disaster and I had to start all over. I couldn't bare to serve them like that. 

So now we know and I thought I'd spread the word on how NOT to go about experimenting with mousse and you're welcome. :) Although I still highly recommend using hot chocolate packets. 

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Tea and Crumpets? Kinda...

Crumpets are a griddle cake that pretty much look like an English Muffin and are mainly eaten in the United Kingdom with tea. Well around these parts, I bake cookies with my tea.

Let's start with the tea. Chai tea has always been my favorite, especially the chai tea lattes at Starbucks. Chai is a black spiced tea from india and the word Chai simply means 'tea' in Hindu. There are strong notes of cinnamon and cloves that stand out but also cardamom and ginger.

I wanted to play off the cloves and cinnamon aspect of the chai. I've made chai frosting before with pumpkin bars but that's a whole new ballgame that we'll get to come fall. I've ironically not been much of a fan of cinnamon but I do enjoy cinnamon sugar so I wanted to incorporate that into the cookie but not too much to where it would take away from the spiced chai flavor.

So I turned to the snickerdoodle. I haven't experimented with the snickerdoodle much but I'm glad I did. The dough is stickier and more doughy than normal cookie dough which gives it a little flakiness. I rolled the dough into balls, rolled it into some cinnamon sugar and baked about 10-12 minutes at 350.

While they were baking I made a chai glaze. It's easier than it sounds. All I used was powdered sugar, water, ground cinnamon and ground cloves. I combined everything with a whisk until I reached a taste and consistency that I wanted and dunked the cookies in. The advantage to the square shape is that it sinks a little in the middle and holds onto more of the glaze that hardens in the fridge after awhile.

I dont mean to toot my own horn but I continue to impress myself and definitely see myself making these in the future. Tea party or not.

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