Mousse

There should have been cake. Before she went into hospital, J had already decided that we would make chocolate peanut butter celebration cake for a joint celebration of her return home and her PA S's birthday, which we normally mark with cake. Sadly, though, cake is off the menu at present: J's unplanned detour via intensive care involved a "nil by mouth" notice and a ng tube, and although her cerebral palsy has never caused her major problems with eating and drinking, her transition back to food by mouth involved a swallowing assessment and was conducted very cautiously. She came home on a level 4 puréed diet, and although we are now gently reintroducing a bit more texture and she is eating more confidently than she was in hospital, we are not yet ready for foods which crumb. She requested chocolate mousse, and I was pleased that she had thought of an alternative to the promised cake.

It's about 25 years since I made this. I requested the recipe from my French penfriend's mother in the late 1970 and in the eighties it was my favourite dessert for entertaining, as it's simple to make and requires no cooking facilities (and thus was ideal in the Paris garret where I cooked on a single small camping gas cylinder fir a year). J enjoyed it, and thought it was a reasonable substitute for cake.