Chocolate Mousse: A Prelude to Mr. Dhanggit's Birthday Dinner: a story of a surprise disaster

December has always been a busy month in our household. My mom's birthday, then comes mine, then my sister's, then our wedding anniversary and then my husband's birthday. All that in December without counting Christmas and New Year's eve. My husband's birthday comes few days before Christmas and I guess it is always frustrating for him that his special day is more often overshadowed by this upcoming holiday. Imagine the frustration to receive just one gift for two occasions or a birthday celebration that is drowned in the Christmas party celebration. That is how I suppose he sees it when he was a kid. That is the reason why ever since I met my husband, no matter what, I always see to it that this day turns a very special day for him. Unfortunately though, everytime I plan out something big or great for him I feel like my "misfortune" angel is always around to mess things up. There was one time I made some hand-made painted T-shirts for him to show off the artistic "genes" I got from my "papush" (FYI: my dad used to be a well known Comics illustrator and painter) but during the drying part, there comes my cousin who seated on them accidentally. The beautiful creations I painted transformed into abstract drawing that even Picasso will not recognize.
The list is really long but the most memorable one I could think of (for this one is really monumental) dates back year 2000. My husband loves snorkelling and beaches so much that I decided to offer him a one week trip to Boracay Island . I have plenty of friends working in the tourism industry so this task was never hard for me. I decided to take a ferry boat for both of us (that is I think about 18 hours of travelling time from Manila) over airplane so that we could profit of a slow phase travelling. I already planified everything in my head: we will have breakfast at the beachside, full day snorkelling and swimming and a romantic dinner at night. I thought, I will surprise him by waking him up with a birthday cake on my hand on his birthday. That would be a lovely day to start all those activities. Since I was really busy with all these plus Christmas preparations I thought I better call up my bestfriend to help me out on this. It's not like she is doing me a favor for the first time for we have been complice so many times already. Let say she is just returning back the favor. I called her up to ask her to buy me a cake. Flavor is not important but it should be a cake that's strong enough to survive our travelling time plus mercury high temperature. I know I was being demanding but she eagerly accepted it. I told her before I put down the phone, anything "except choco-mousse cake". And she replied, "no problem". The next day she was waiting for us 8am at the Pier with the cakebox hidden in a plastic bag. She smiled and told me "mission accomplished". I was so happy and so excited for this trip that I organized. I don't know why in the 18 hours of travelling in the ferry I never even peeped into that cake box that my friend gave me. I hid it immediately because I want everything to be a "surprise". Everything went as planned. We arrived late at night in the island, we checked-in at our resort and slept because we were really tired. The next day, I barely slept. I was really excited I was already up by 5 am. I was so eager to do my "surprise happy birthday stint" for my darling. So I took out immediately the cake box from the plastic bag hidden in the mini fridge and opened it. Much to my dismay, there was nothing in the box but a sort of a chocolate liquid. That doesn't look appetizing at all but looks like more of a (pardon my word) "vomit. I cried but I couldn't make it loud for I don't want to wake him up. But my emotions are much stronger and I finally blurted into tears. Evidently, this woke up my husband. When he realised the reason why I was crying, he laugh so hard and find the entire situation funny and cute. He said it wasn't that important what matters for him is me and that we are together everything else is just a garnishing...."wow" I was really touched. I was only able to get in touch with my friend after our one week trip because it was still hard to get a signal back then. She was so excited and asked me how did it went. I asked her why on earth of all the cake that existed she bought me a "choco-mousse cake". You know what she told me. She said "I forgot all the instructions you gave me but I clearly remember choco-mousse cake, its the only thing I remember.." In case you are wondering we are still best of friends, I just dont ask her to buy me cake anymore.

And did I mention that there was a typhoon too in the island during our vacation.. As my husband's birthday approaches I'm keeping my fingers cross.

Chocolate Mousse

200 g of Dark chocolate 3 large eggs separated white from yolk 10 g of unsalted butter 1 cup cold heavy cream 2 tbps of sugar Whip the cream then put in the fridge. Melt the chocolate with the butter in bain marie, stirring constantly until it smoothen. Cut the fire, beat the egg whites then add the sugar and continue beating until they are foamy gently until its foamy. Add sugar and continue beating. Add the yolks in the chocolate mixture. Fold in the whipped cream in the chocolate-yolk mixture. Gently incorporate the beaten egg whites. Put in the fridge for a minimum of 3 hours.

For my french readers, you can find the french version of this mousse au chocolat recipe here:
http://www.lesfoodies.com/hilda/recette/mousse-au-chocolat