Torta de Mousse de Maracujá

This dessert is what I like to call a Brazilian Gem! It is absolutely delicious! Tart, sweet, creamy and cold!

This particular recipe was a bit of a challenge to reproduce because passion fruit and the extract or pulp are very difficult to find in most grocery stores in the USA. You will need to go to an Asian market or preferably a Latin American market to find the extract or frozen pulp. You might be able to find the pulp on line. If you are lucky depending on where you live you may find the fruit at your local market.

This recipe is originally made with lady fingers cookies but they can be difficult to find so I substituted here for graham crackers and it works beautifully. You can also use vanilla wafers cookies.

This recipe is very easy to make but requires some extra time chilling to achieve consistency. Make a day before planing on serving.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups passion fruit extract or defrosted passion fruit pulp.
• 2 cans condensed milk.
• 1 pint whipping cream.
• 10 table spoons of powdered sugar
• 1 box of Honey Graham crackers, vanilla wafers or lady fingers.
• 1 and 1/2 cups of sugar (+ 2 table spoons if using fresh fruit and seeds for topping).
• 2 passion fruits or dark chocolate shavings if you can’t find the fruit.
• 1 teas spoon corn starch.
• 1 and 1/2 cups of water.

Directions:

1. Whisk condensed milk and 1 cup of passion extract or pulp in a glass bowl. Cover and place in refrigerator for one hour.
2. Meanwhile in a food processor, whip cream until fluffy and slowly fold powdered sugar into whipped cream. Cover and place in refrigerator until needed.
3. While the creams are resting in refrigerator, let’s make a syrup! Dissolve corn starch in 1/2 cup of water. Then in a sauce pan, mix 1 cup sugar and 1/2 cup of passion fruit extract or defrosted pulp add the corn starch water and stirr constantly at a high heat. When it starts to boil turn heat to medium low, keep stirring constantly for a few minutes until starts to slightly thicken. Transfer syrup to a glass container, let it cool, cover and place it in refrigerator until needed.
4. When hour is up fold whipped cream into passion fruit cream. Cover and place in freezer for one hour.
5. When hour is up, remove mousse from freezer and gently mix by folding it with a fork scraping the sides. Place it back in freezer for another hour.
6. While mousse is chilling in freezer, in a shallow bowl, mix the remaining 1/2 cup of passion fruit extract or pulp with 1/2 cup of sugar and 1 cup of water and place in refrigerator until needed.
7. Cut passion fruit, scoop pulp and seeds in to a bowl, stir in 2 table spoons of sugar, keep in refrigerator until needed.
8. To assemble, deep Graham Crackers, lady fingers or vanilla wafers in the passion juice in the shallow bowl, one by one arranging them on the bottom of a rectangular glass dish approximately 9 x 11 inches. Spread some of the mousse on top and place another layer of crackers or cookies deepened in juice. Keep doing this procedure until mousse is finished. The last layer should be of mousse. Cover with plastic wrap and place in freezer for at least 2 hours.
9. Once top is frozen, pour the passion fruit syrup that was chilling in the refrigerator over the top, garnish with the pulp and seeds of the passion fruit or chocolate shavings. Cover and place it back in freezer until ready to serve.
10. To cut,remove from freezer 10 minutes before serving. Keep in Freezer.

Enjoy!