Happy Anniversary

It's the Xth dating anniversary with my bf today and we went celebrate the special day with a dinner at Guu.  It's been the second time for us to be there. Too bad we lost the spot at the counter and we got a table at the side.  Food is still good though but we ordered quite a lot of deep fried food and it was really filling.  It's monday but the place is still packed and very lively.  It was still a good and relaxing dinner.

Finally had the macha coco cocktail which is made of macha, malibu, milk and topped with a dollop of whipping cream.  Never thought that macha tastes good with coconut malibu. Maybe I will make a cake using the combination.

So for this special day I made a pina colada mousse cake.  I always like the taste of pina colada but had never made a cake out of it.  I have looked online in search of recipes, or recipes of similar parts so I can combine, but it's not easy! I ended up experimenting on my own.  To my surprise the result is not bad for a first timer.  There is room for improvement but definitely can do this again.

For a 6" cake
Pina Colada Mousse
Ingredients:
125g milk
58g sugar
10g gelatin
1 egg
60g whipped whipping cream
45g strained pineapple juice
5g malibu rum (optional)

Method:

1. Mix sugar and gelatin. Set aside.
2. Heat up the milk until just before getting into boil. Add sugar and gelatin and stir until dissolve.
3. Lightly beat the egg and temper the egg with the hot milk. Set aside to cool to room temperature.
4. Prepare pina colada mixture with coconut cream, pineapple juice and rum. Add the mixture into the cooled egg mixture.
5. Fold in whipping cream.

Pineapple Gelee
Ingredients:
1/2 cup crushed pineapple with juice
2 tbsp malibu rum
3/8 tsp gelatin

1.  Reserve 2 tbsp of crushed pineapple juice to dissolve gelatin. Put in microwave for 8 seconds or until it dissolves. Add gelatin into the rest of the pineapple and refrigerate in a ring mould.

Dacquoise
(From The Sweet Trick by Susumu Koyama)
Ingredients:
80g egg white
23g caster sugar
1.5g meringue powder
47g ground almond
47g icing sugar
8g cake flour

Method:

1. Whisk egg white to soft peak. Gradually add sugar and meringue powder in 3 sessions and whisk until stiff peaks.
2. Sieve almond, icing sugar and cake flour and fold into the egg whites.
3. Pipe mixture into two 6 inch rounds. Bake in 350F and bake for 20 mins.

Assembly:

1. Wrap a 6 inch ring mould with cling wrap. Put the ring upside down.
2. Pour 1/3 of the mousse into the prepared ring mould and refrigerate until set.
3. Lightly slide the pineapple gelee onto the mousse. Poured the rest of the mousse on top.
4. Trim the dacquoise into a size slightly smaller than the ring mould. Put the dacquoise upside down and slightly push until the mousse mixture comes flush with the top of dacquoise. Keep refrigerated.
5. Release the cake from the mould. Sprinkle desiccated coconut around the cake. Serve!