France-Italia Millefeuille-Mascarpone

Millefeuille-Mascarpone with crushed Almonds, Chocolate & Raspberries

One thing I love about living in different countries, dining in different restaurants is learning each time something new about cooking. I can usually reproduce something that I've eaten or observed rather quickly. I can also come out with something "new". Of course this also means that I eat alot and do spend much of my waking moments reading and thinking about food.

When we invited DC over for dinner, Hub reminded me that I mustn't make anything exotic for dessert as the last time I did so the poor guy suffered. I was hoping to make a Mung Bean dessert (Tau Suan) but I guess that it will have to wait for another day.

He likes classic French and Italian cuisines from what I know so that gave me the idea to make a very simple Millefeuille-Mascarpone dessert.

Vanilla Pod

E very generously offered me a few precious vanilla pods from some exotic island a few months ago. I've saved them for an occasion like this and it was well worth the wait.

The Millefeuille :

Place puff pastry on a baking tray. Put a metal grill on top of it to stop the pastry from rising too much when it is being baked. Bake in a hot oven (180ºC) for 20 minutes. Slice off the edges and cut the pastry into smaller squares or rectangles. Set aside to cool.

The Mascarpone :

Slice open one or 2 vanilla pods and scrape out the seeds. Add them to 120ml of whipping cream. Do not waste the empty pod, put it in a jar with white sugar to make vanilla sugar.

Add sugar to taste to the whipping cream. Followed by half a Tsp of instant expresso coffee.

Whip the cream till it's stiff.

Add 250ml of good mascarpone to the whipped cream, plus some good rum. Whip the whole thing together taking care not to overdo it as the cream could become flat. Cover with food film and leave it for a few hours in the fridge.

The Garnishing :

Roughly crush some whole roasted peeled almonds as well as some dark chocolate.

Rinse some fresh raspberries.

Just before serving, take out the mascarpone. Give it a few quick turns with a big spoon, it may stiffen further. Scoop some mascarpone and place it in a bowl. Sprinkle some roughly-crushed almonds and chocolate over it and add in a few raspberries. Place a millefeuille on the mascarpone and scoop more mascarpone on top of it. Repeat operation with the almonds, chocolate and raspberries.