Champagne.

Strawberries.

Chocolate.

These are three must-have ingredients for any Valentine's Day dessert.

Then, of course, you can experiment with a cooking style out of the ordinary.

Drench and ignite your dessert, flamb?-style.

Serve your desserts in fancy crockery, cutlery and special Valentine serviettes.

Woo your love with these Valentine delicacies!

 

 



Champagne Sorbet Recipe

A chilled sorbet is a great treat for your Valentine and easy to make!

~ Ingredients
2 cups water
1 cup granulated sugar (sugar crystals)
1 1/4 cup champagne
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 tbsp orange juice

~ Method

Heat water and sugar in a saucepan until the sugar dissolves.

Keep stirring the syrup and bring to a boil.

Let it simmer, uncovered, for 10 minutes without stirring.

Take sugar syrup off the fire and let it cool.

Pour into a tall glass. Add champagne, lemon juice and orange juice into the sugar syrup.

Freeze this mixture until ice crystals begin to form.

Remove from the freezer.

Beat the mixture well in a blender, till all the ice crystals break down.

Put it back into the freezer until it firms.

Remove from freezer and place it in your refrigerator 20 minutes before serving.

It is best served in a martini glass or a champagne tulip. Place a strawberry or cherry on top of the mix.

Want a low cost option? Replace champagne with white wine.

Don't want alcohol? Do away with it altogether!



Chocolate Kahlua Mousse

Sink your teeth into this awesome treat that is soft, yet bittersweet!

Kahlua, a coffee liqueur, gives the bittersweet flavour to this culinary delight.

~ Ingredients

2 tbsp Kahlua
1/2 tsp instant coffee
1 cup heavy cream (known as double cream in the market. You can get it loose, or buy Amul's double cream)
230 gm dark sweet chocolate
1/4 cup powdered sugar
2 egg yolks
2 egg whites

~ Method

Over low flame, melt dark chocolate and butter in a pan. Keep aside when it melts.

Separate the two egg whites from the two egg yolks (crack the egg, open the two halves, pour only the white into a glass and the yellow into another).

In a bowl, add coffee powder, sugar, egg yolks and Kahlua.

Blend in chocolate into this mixture.

In a separate bowl, whip cream until it forms stiff peaks. (You have to whip vigorously, and make sure you don't over-whip it.)

Fold whipped cream into the Kahlua-chocolate mixture gently.

In another bowl, beat egg whites until soft peaks form.

Fold the egg whites into the Kahlua-chocolate mixture.

Pour this mixture into a serving bowl or dessert glasses.

Refrigerate for four hours or overnight.

Don't want alcohol? Skip the Kahlua altogether. Use coffee extract (coffee powder dissolved in water).



Strawberry Flamb?

There's nothing like a sizzling flamb? to stoke the flames of passion!

~ Ingredients
2 cups strawberries
1 tsp butter
1 cup white sugar
Zest of 1 lemon (the outermost layer of the lemon rind, which is used for flavouring)
Zest of 1 orange
4 scoops vanilla ice cream
Juice of 1 orange
2 tbsp brandy

~ Method

Slice each strawberry in half.

Heat a large saucepan, and saut? the strawberries in butter lightly in one side of the pan.

In the other side, melt sugar.

When sugar almost melts, add the orange juice and zests.

Carefully add brandy and watch out for the flame!

Serve sizzling hot over vanilla ice cream.