Romantic Dessert Makeover: Lighter Dark Chocolate Mousse

Call me a chocolate fiend but when I think about "the most romantic" dessert...I can't help but think about (or should I say salivate over) chocolate mousse. Love the rich taste; love the light texture; love basically everything about it.

This lust for chocolate mousse must be genetic because my oldest daughter shares my passion. While she was visiting from college, I was inspired to create a light but luscious version of dark chocolate mousse. It was as if creating a light mousse and pleasing her discerning young palate was the holy grail of recipe doctoring.

I used high cacao bittersweet chocolate chips along with a nice dose of cocoa powder. I used a shot of strong coffee and a tablespoon of brandy to compliment the dark chocolate flavor nicely. Instead of 2 large eggs I used 4 egg whites and 4 tablespoons of egg substitute (this is a pasteurized product), which drastically cut the cholesterol and eliminated the need to use raw egg yolks. The extra egg whites allowed me to use a lot less whipping cream to give the chocolate mousse it's light texture.

The Savings
Original chocolate mousse (same serving size) contains:
286 calories, 22 grams total fat, 13 grams saturated fat, 99 mg cholesterol

Light chocolate mousse contains:
215 calories. 13 grams total fat, 8 grams saturated fat, 22 mg cholesterol
A savings of 71 calories, 9 grams of fat, 5 grams saturated fat, 77 mg cholesterol

This lighter mousse still tastes like a decadent dessert and with 13 grams of fat and 8 grams of saturated fat per serving, it still is nutritionally decadent! But this very satisfying remake contains 25% fewer calories, around 40% less fat and saturated fat, and 78% less cholesterol.

Let the romance begin!

Now here's the recipe.

Lighter Dark Chocolate Mousse

Photo: Elaine Magee

Ingredients:

1 1/3 cup bittersweet chocolate chips (8 ounces)
2 tablespoons cocoa powder (unsweetened)
5 tablespoons strong coffee (if you would rather not use coffee, just substitute 5 tablespoons water)
1 tablespoon brandy
1/4 cup egg substitute (2 egg yolks can be substituted)
3 tablespoons powdered sugar, divided use
1/8 teaspoon salt (optional)
4 egg whites
2/3 cup light whipping cream

Preparation

1. In microwave-safe medium bowl, combine chocolate chips, cocoa powder, coffee, and brandy. Microwave on DEFROST until chocolate is almost completely melted (about a minute). Stir to finish melting the chocolate.
2. In small bowl, whisk egg substitute with 1 tablespoon of the powdered sugar and salt if desired for about 20 seconds. Stir egg substitute mixture into the chocolate mixture.
3. In large mixing bowl, beat egg whites on medium speed until frothy (about 1 minute) using an electric mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, and then add 2 tablespoons powdered sugar. Beat egg whites on HIGH speed until soft peaks form (about 1 minute more). Stir about 1/2 cup of the whipped egg whites into the chocolate mixture to lighten up the chocolate mixture. Softly fold the remaining egg whites into the chocolate mixture using a rubber spatula.
4. In same mixing bowl that held the egg whites, whip whipping cream on medium speed until thickened slightly then increase speed to high and beat until soft peaks form. Gently fold whipped cream into chocolate mixture using the rubber spatula.
5. Spoon mousse into 8 individual cups. Cover with plastic wrap or foil and refrigerate for at least 1 hour. Enjoy within 2 to 3 days.

Yeild: Makes 8 servings

Nutritional Analysis per serving: 215 calories, 4 g protein, 21.5 grams carbohydrate, 13 g fat, 8 grams saturated fat, 4.5 g monounsaturated fat, .5 g polyunsaturated fat, 22 mg cholesterol, 2 g fiber, 53 mg sodium. Calories from fat: 54 percent. Omega-3 fatty acids = .1 gram, Omega-6 fatty acids = .4 gram.

Happy Valentine's Day.

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Breakfast for Dinner: Omelet Night!

cursedthing / CC BY-ND 2.0

Are you out of ideas for dinner? Time to have breakfast for dinner. This is one of my favorite weeknight dinner strategies when I don't want to drive to the store and I just want to make do with what I have on hand.

Got eggs and cheese? Got frozen hash browns in the freezer? Got some veggies you need to use in the crisper? Sounds like Omelet Night at the Magee house!

Tonight I started the hash browns going in a nonstick frying pan with about 1 teaspoon canola oil per serving of hash browns. Next I sautéed some onions and sliced mushrooms with some canola cooking spray until they began to brown. Then I threw in some fresh spinach (I always have some on hand for salads) and a splash of water and sautéed that with the mushrooms and onions to cook down the spinach slightly. Put aside the veggies while you beat some high omega-3 eggs with egg substitute (I use 1 egg and 1/4 cup egg substitute per omelet).

You are ready to start making your omelets using 1/2 cup of your egg mixture per omelet. Once you flip over each omelet, top with an ounce of reduced fat shredded cheese and some of your veggie filling (at least 1/2 cup cooked veggies).

I estimate that this dinner (4 ounces fat free shredded hash brown browned with 1 teaspoon canola oil, an omelet, a few slices of fresh tomato) added up to:

Calories: 365 calories
Protein: 26 grams
Carbohydrate: 35 grams
Fat: 14 grams fat (34% calories from fat)
Saturated fat: 5 grams
Monounsaturated fat: 6 grams
Polyunsaturated fat: 2 grams
Cholesterol: 240 mg
Fiber: 5 grams
Sodium: 447 mg
Omega-3 fatty acids = 1 gram

Serve each omelet dinner with 2 strips of turkey bacon and the total is:

Calories: 435
Protein: 30 grams
Carbohydrate: 35 grams
Fat: 19 grams (39% calories from fat)
Saturated fat: 7 grams
Monounsaturated fat: 8 grams
Polyunsaturated fat: 4 grams
Cholesterol: 270 mg
Fiber: 5 grams
Sodium: 807 mg
Omega-3 fatty acids = 1 gram

Tell me about some of your breakfast for dinner adventures!

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Bagged Salad and Bacteria: What YOU Can Do

catsper / CC BY 2.0

Pretty much the last thing you want on your salad greens is bacteria that tends to reside in human feces. Many people, including me, buy the pre-washed spinach and romaine lettuce in bags expecting them to be clean and bacteria-free.

Well, Consumer Reports pretty much blew this belief out of the water. According to their recent tests, 39 percent of packaged salad green samples exceeded the level for total coliforms considered acceptable and 23 percent exceeded this level for enterococcus bacteria...bacteria that Consumer Reports describes as "better indicators of fecal contamination." Shocked and concerned? I know I am. The first question that pops into my mind is what type of feces are we talking about - animal or human (not that any type of fecal bacteria is more desirable than another)?

What did researchers look for?

• Total coliforms: Water is commonly tested for total coliforms to indicate the general quality of the water and the likelihood the water is fecally contaminated. According to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), "Coliforms are a group of bacteria, most of which are harmless. At first glance, it might seem strange that a harmless group of bacteria such as coliforms could cause such commotion. But like police tape and chalk outlines, coliform bacteria are often found at the scene of a crime even though they are not themselves criminals."


• Enterococcus: One of the bacteria they tested for is enterococcus. If this refers to enterococcus faecalis then we are talking about an extremely durable bacterium that normally lives in the gastro-intestinal tracts of humans. How durable are we talking about? It can survive 77 days on dirt. Food technologists from the Agricultural Research Service Produce Quality and Safety Laboratory discovered recently that bacteria can actually become hardier and more likely to survive exposure to stomach acid when the bacteria are sitting in air-starved containers/bags while in the presence of nutrients, which are coming from the cut leaves of lettuce.

What are the symptoms?
What types of symptoms can someone expect from bacteria contamination in their salad greens? It all depends on the bacteria. If it's enterococcus faecalis, someone might experience fever, confusion, urinary tract infection with painful urination and blood in urine. The bacteria responsible for the food poisoning outbreak with raw spinach in previous years, E. coli, can cause severe stomach cramps and diarrhea, nausea and vomiting.

What can we do to decrease our risk of consuming high amounts of bacteria on salad greens (bagged or otherwise)?

• Buy bags of salads greens from the back of the shelf and as far from their use-by date as you can get your hands on. Consumer Reports found in their tests that the packages one to five days from their use-by date were more likely to have higher bacteria levels.


• In light of this new information about washed and packaged lettuce, particularly spinach, is it better to buy a head of lettuce? It seems like it might be better to buy it as a head since the bags, due to the low oxygen environment in the bag (which encourages the lettuce to stay fresh) seems to encourage bacteria growth if they are improperly stored (unrefrigerated for an extended period).


• Try to buy ready-to-eat salads and salad green from stores where they appear to be properly stored at cold temperatures and keep them at cold temperatures when you are storing them at home.


• Wash your greens yourself when you bring them home from the store, even the prewashed or triple-washed ones. Rinse them well in clean, running water and pat them dry or use a salad spinner to remove excess water. If you aren't using them immediately, you can put the salad greens in a clean bag, not the same bag you bought them in. The longer the greens sit in the bags and the closer to their use-by date, the more chance the bacteria has to multiply.

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Taste Test Tuesday: Oroweat Whole Grain & Flax Bread

My family of four blew through this loaf of bread in 48 hours, which must mean everyone liked it a lot. The note, "Contains Omega-3" on the package caught my eye when I was looking to grab a loaf the other day. I checked the ingredient label and indeed whole wheat flour was the first ingredient and flaxseed was the 5th ingredient.

I also checked the nutrition facts before I dropped the bread in my cart. Each slice contributes 3 grams of fiber and 4 grams of protein. Later when I was home and had my magnifying glass handy, I was looking to see how much omega-3s each slice of bread contains. The package states that each serving provides 14 milligrams of EPA and DHA omega-3 fatty acids. Wait a minute...those are the fish omega-3s, not the omega-3s that you get from plants (ALA). So I checked the ingredient label more thoroughly and sure enough further down in the list there was Menhaden oil (a type of fish oil). Don't worry though; this bread has a nice pleasant flavor. Unless I missed it, the label doesn't tell us how many milligrams of plant omega-3s are in each slice.

So if you use this bread to make a sandwich, using 2 slices of bread, you would be adding .28 milligrams of fish omega-3s to your diet plus some plant omega-3s from the flaxseed and soybean oil. I'm guessing this bread tastes particularly pleasant in part because it contains a fair amount of sugar and sodium. Sugar is listed as the third ingredient and each slice contains 3 grams of sugar (17 grams of total carbohydrate), which computes to 12% calories from sugar. Each slice also contains 160 milligrams, which means a sandwich would contribute 320 milligrams not including the sandwich filler.

The first 5 ingredients:
Whole wheat flour, water, sugar, cracked wheat, flaxseed.

1 slice = 100 calories, 4 g protein, 17 g carbohydrate (3 g sugar), 1.5 g fat, 0 g saturated fat, 0 g trans fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 3 g fiber, 160 mg sodium. Calories from fat: 13.5% calories from fat.

Bottom line: While I would love for this bread to have a little less sugar and sodium, this might be a good bread to try if you are looking for a whole wheat bread that your family will like and that also contributes some omega-3s from fish and flax.

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Recipe: Honey Curry Butternut Squash

Here's one of my favorite recipes for frozen butternut squash!

I love using frozen butternut squash cubes because you can cut a couple of the first food prep steps from most recipes calling for butternut squash. You know...cutting the butternut squash into large pieces, scooping out the seeds and rind, roasting the large pieces until tender and then removing the hard outer shell from the tender flesh.

Making the following recipe is a lot easier with the frozen squash cubes. Cut the bag and dump the cubes out onto the prepared baking dish. That's it! Then just whip up the honey curry glaze while the butternut squash is baking-you drizzle it over the roasted cubes at the very end of baking.

This side dish tastes great with grilled or roasted lean meat but I also really like it as a side dish for pasta. Each serving adds a nice dose of fiber and vitamins A and C.

Honey Curry Butternut Squash

Photo: Elaine Magee

Ingredients:

20 ounces frozen butternut squash cubes (about 4 cups), lightly defrosted
Canola oil cooking spray
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon whipped butter
2 tablespoons honey
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
1 teaspoon red curry powder
1/8 teaspoon chili powder (increase to 1/4 teaspoon if you like a little more bite)

Preparation:

1. Preheat oven to 450-degrees and line a jelly roll pan with foil. Coat the foil with canola cooking spray.
2. Spread butternut squash cubes in single layer on prepared baking sheet. Bake for 15 minutes. Meanwhile, in small nonstick saucepan, combine olive oil, whipped butter, honey, vinegar, curry powder, and chili powder and cook over medium heat for about a minute, stirring constantly. Remove from heat.
3. After 15 minutes of baking the squash, gently toss the cubes and bake another 10 minutes. Drizzle the curry glaze over the top and toss to coat the cubes well. Bake another 5 minutes. Spoon into a serving bowl and enjoy!

Yield: Makes 4 servings

Nutritional Analysis per serving: 127 calories, 1 g protein, 21 g carbohydrate, 5 g fat, 1.5 g saturated fat, 2.5 g monounsaturated fat, 1 g polyunsaturated fat, 5 mg cholesterol, 4 g fiber, 25 mg sodium. Calories from fat: 35 percent. Omega-3 fatty acids = .2 gram, Omega-6 fatty acids = .8 gram. Each serving also contributes 200% of the Daily Value for vitamin A and 30% for vitamin C.