Easy-peasy dairy-free strawberry mousse

I always feel a bit sad when my children can't enjoy the sorts of puddings I ate when I was small. Luckily, the ingredients can be found to make equivalent puddings if you know where to look. I discovered this dairy-free whipping cream alternative a while back, and have used it to make eton mess and mousse for the girls in the past. It is good enough for us all to eat, and that is saying something! It doesn't whip up to the lovely softness that you get with real cream, but it is acceptable in pudding making.

So, today I thought I'd make a strawberry mousse for tomorrow's pudding. It's very simple, all you need is a pack of jelly and a carton of dairy-free cream.

Place the jelly block in the microwave for 1 minute with 100ml of water.
Take it out of the microwave and stir to make sure it's all melted, then add 150ml of iced water (with ice chips in if possible) to bring it back to room temperature or less.








In as big a bowl as possible, whisk up the dairy-free cream. The colder it is, the better - refrigerate if possible before use.

Once the cream has been whisked and the jelly cooled, pour the jelly into the cream and get whisking! It will start off looking scummy and unappetising, but very quickly foams up to look pretty good. The big bowl is important here, as otherwise it sprays up over the top when you whisk the jelly mix in.




The finished mousse, ready to go into the fridge to set overnight. Sometimes, the jelly starts to drop down before it sets properly, so you get a thin layer of jelly at the bottom of the bowl. This can work in your favour if you are making individual ones, as you can turn them out and have the jelly sitting pretty on top.

Another bonus is that my eco-warrior 5-year-old can feel safe in the knowledge that all we threw in the bin was a jelly wrapper, as the carton was recycled. Phew!



10/5/12

Quick update - the mousse went down very well, it was light and bubbly and very tasty. The girls now want me to make a chocolate one, which is going to take some research and planning!