Last night, I had 2 spare eggs, a can of coconut milk, insomnia and an extreme craving for creamy desserty things...so I decided to do a little food science. Usually I don't hold with 'paleo' desserts as they invariably contain a lot of nut flour/honey/agave nectar which IMO makes them unpaleo. However these 2 contain minimal or no sugar, and no nut flours
EXPERIMENT 1
paleo 'creme brulee'/ custard
I *love* creme brulee and pre-paleo I used to make it all the time. Here I attempt to make a dairy-free version
INGREDIENTS
2 egg yolks
drop honey (literally)
vanilla
pinch arrowroot
1/4 teaspoon ghee
200ml coconut milk
some grated creamed coconut
nutmeg
Note - coconut cream is required rather than coconut milk, so I grated creamed coconut into the coconut milk, added a bit of ghee, then boiled it til it reduced by 1/3. Alternatively, you can allow the can of coconut milk to separate into coconut water and coconut cream, skim the cream off and use that.
METHOD
1) beat eggs with the drop of honey and arrowroot til thick.
2) heat up coconut cream til it boils, add the vanilla and nutmeg then remove from the heat.
3) Add the hot cream to the egg, gradually, stirring vigorously
4) pour mixture back into saucepan and heat til it thickens - 1-2 mins
5) remove from heat, transfer to fridge to set overnight
RESULTS
I ate 1/4 of the mixture while it was warm and it was yummy and custardy. The rest went into the fridge but alas in the morning was not set like a normal creme brulee....it was just thick, cold custard. I whacked it in the freezer and will use it as an icecream base when I have more coconut cream
EXPERIMENT 2 - RASPBERRY MOUSSE
INGREDIENTS
2 egg whites
pinch salt
raspberries, pureed - say 50-75g
coconut cream OR coconut milk+grated creamed coconut
METHOD
1) take the whites out of the fridge and allow to warm to RT
2) use a very CLEAN and DRY bowl and whisk - make sure both are grease free. The larger the bowl the better!
3) whisk the whites til they are foamy, add a couple of drops of lemon juice then continue to whisk til soft peaks form
4) Puree the raspberries
5) Whip the coconut cream. This is the hard part. If you only have coconut milk, whip it with an electric whisk and periodically remove the foam from the top. The milk will get more and more watery as you do this. You will be left with a pile of foam, let this stand for 5 minutes or so and then drain away the water that comes out of the bottom
6) stir pureed raspberries into the whipped coconut cream, then fold the egg whites into the mixture. Refrigerate.
RESULTS
passable - although after 2 hrs in the fridge it had separated slightly and I had to drain water out of the bottom - maybe because I used frozen raspberries? I think that a less-watery stronger-flavoured fruit than raspberries would be better, like lemon (mainly zest and only a little flesh) as this recipe does not seem to like water.
Anyway, the good thing about mousse is it's volume-to-calorie ratio. Coconut-based mousse sadly does not have the creamy smoothness of actual cream-based mousse though
UPDATE - mousse separates on standing in fridge. Avoid and try the custard instead!
