The beetroot in this recipe will need to be baked first so factor this into your cooking time if you haven't done it in advance.
Ingredients;
- 250g whole beetroot, in their skins
- 400g good dark chocolate, broken into pieces
- 175g unsalted butter, diced
- 6 eggs, separated
- 175g caster sugar
- 25g ground almonds
- A few drops almond essence (or use vanilla)
How to make Chocolate beetroot mousse cake
To cook the beetroot;
- Wrap each one in foil and place in a baking dish.
- Bake in the oven at 200C until soft (test by inserting a sharp knife).
- This can take anything from 45 minutes to 1 ½ hours, depending on the size of your beetroot, but can be done in advance.
- Remove from the oven, leave until cool enough to handle
- Unwrap the foil, then rub off the skins; they should come off easily (wear a pair of rubber gloves to keep your hands from turning pink if you like).
- Blitz the beetroot in a food processor until smooth.
To make the Chocolate beetroot mousse cake
- Grease and line a 23cm springform cake tin, leaving about 2cm of baking parchment above the rim of the tin, as the mixture rises quite high while baking.
- Preheat your oven to 180C.
- Put the chocolate and butter in a large heatproof bowl, one that fits snugly over a pan of barely simmering water.
- Once the chocolate and butter have melted, remove from the heat and leave to cool.
- While the chocolate is cooling, in another large bowl, whisk the egg yolks and sugar until light, pale and voluminous. This will take 4-5 minutes with a hand held electric mixer.
- Add the ground almonds, almond essence and puréed beetroot and stir to combine.
- Whisk the egg whites in a separate bowl until they form soft peaks.
- Fold the chocolate mixture into the egg yolk and beetroot.
- Stir gently until all the mixture is combined.
- Using a metal slotted spoon, fold in a large spoonful of the egg whites.
- Mix it in until you can’t see any white bits, then very gently fold in the rest, keeping as much air in the mixture as possible.
- Make sure there are no white bits visible in the mixture.
- Bake in the oven for 40-45 minutes, until the mixture has risen well, and still has a bit of a bounce to it when pressed. It may have cracked slightly, this is normal.
- Remove from the oven, leave to cool completely in the tin on a wire rack before transferring to your serving plate.
- Dust over a mixture of cocoa powder and icing sugar to serve. It will sink slightly as there’s no four in the mixture and will be gooey in the middle if you eat it the same day and slightly firmer after 24 hours.
Recipe from www.riverford.co.uk