Rich and decadent vegan chocolate mousse with honeycomb essence. Childhood flavours for a seriously adult dessert!

Did you / do you still love a Cadbury Crunchie bar?  Apparently they’re not available in the US – so apologies to our American readers who may have no idea what I’m referring to here!  They were a firm favourite of mine as a kid.  That cinder toffee bar wrapped in rich, creamy chocolate.  Unfortunately they’re not vegan.  This chocolate mousse is though 😉

Aquafaba is a thing of miracles.  I’ve no idea who first discovered that whisking chickpea water made meringue.  Was it a scientist?  A kitchen genius?  No matter who, I’m eternally grateful to them.

You will need some kind of electric whisk though – unless you have forearms like Popeye!  Aquafaba takes a little longer to whisk than normal egg meringue before you have those frothy peaks.

I’m also grateful to Foodie Flavours and their (almost)  limitless variety of flavours and essences.

These little bottles of joy are one of my very favourite ingredients to work with as they impart SO MUCH flavour from just a few drops.  And when you’re making something like a delicately soft mousse that you want to give another level of flavour to, these essences really come into their own.  Adding flavour without a change in texture or form.

This honeycomb essence is a brand new flavour of theirs, but I hand on heart recommend any of them.  I’m working my way through them all, slowly.

I made my own honeycomb as a garnish for this chocolate mousse for no other reason than aesthetics!  The essence gives you all the honeycomb flavour you’ll ever need without the sweet sweet crunchy shards!  And while honeycomb itself isn’t difficult to make it can be a bit daunting for anyone that isn’t used to boiling their own sugar and then foaming the bejeezus out of it with bicarbonate of soda.  It also feels like it deserves its own page, because there’ll definitely be chocolate dipping involved!

This chocolate mousse is SO light – with only a few simple and readily available ingredients and taking just minutes to make.

Vegan Chocolate – use a high quality chocolate here if you can.  Chocolate itself is plant based, making it ‘naturally’ vegan.  But in between being a bean growing on a tree and the stuff you buy in the shops it goes through a whole process where it can get a variety of additives including milk and sugar.  The best quality vegan chocolate should only contain cocoa, cocoa butter, sweetener and occasionally vanilla.  Cheaper and lesser quality chocolate bars use other ingredients as filler to bulk out and minimise the use of the more costly cocoa bean.

Side fact – mum and dad used to have a Doberman cross called Cocoa Bean.  When I was born he was my guardian and protector.  Unfortunately he died before I can really remember him.  Guess it was always my destiny to be involved with food!  And to have dogs 😉

Aquafaba – aka chickpea water.  Any can of cooked chickpeas will do.  Simply drain the liquid and whisk to foamy peaks!  And don’t throw away those chickpeas!  Make hummus, roast them with garlic, make falafel or veggie nuggets or throw them in a big pan of paella!

Icing Sugar – or powdered sugar to our previously mentioned American friends!  I find icing sugar gives a smoother, silkier meringue than caster sugar.  Particularly for raw meringue like this chocolate mousse.

Cream of Tartar – this helps stabilise any meringue.  Even egg white meringue. It helps give meringue those characteristic high peaks.  You can also use lemon juice.

Honeycomb Essence – just a few drops of this essence is needed to elevate a chocolate mousse into decadently rich vegan chocolate heaven.

This honestly couldn’t be easier to make.  There’s no baking, very little stirring and I challenge ANYONE to know this was vegan without prior knowledge 😉

If you make this recipe or any of the recipes from The Cook & Him we’d LOVE to see! Just snap a picture and share it on Instagram using #thecookandhim and tagging @thecookandhim in the photo itself (as this guarantees we’ll see your picture!)

And don’t forget to follow us on Instagram , Facebook or Twitter for even more recipe inspiration and chat, competitions, behind the scenes and so much more!