Rattlesnake Pasta and Lemon Champaigne Mousse

First of all, let me start my first blog off by saying that I'm not the best cook, but I can follow directions. I will be going through recipes that I want to learn and will tell you how each of them turn out and any changes I would make. I will also tell you about great food that I find in my travels.

Friday night, we had our friends Ericka and Adam over for dinner. We had a nice evening with dinner and some board games. Usually when I have guests for dinner, I like to try a new dish. This time, I tried two new dishes. The main course was very similar to J. Alexander's Rattlesnake Pasta. The dessert was a Lemon Champagne Mousse. So, I'm going to give you the recipes first, then tell you how each turned out.


The Pasta

Ingredients:
8 tablespoons butter
1 cup heavy cream
12 tablespoons Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons flour
Salt and pepper to taste
1/2 Cup each of Red, Green, Yellow, and Orange Peppers
3 tablespoons minced garlic in olive oil
1 lb. roasted chicken chunks
Spaghetti

Directions:

Combine butter, cream, Parmesan cheese, flour and salt and pepper and heat very slowly till thickened. Add the peppers, garlic and roasted chicken and heat through. Serve over spaghetti.

The pasta turned out great! The original recipe called for 1 cup of Jalapenos, and no red, green, orange or yellow peppers. It also called for 10oz of chicken, which is about what I made, but it could definitely use more. It's best if you cut the chicken before you cook it. I also serverd some garlic bread along with it - just the Publix brand which is very tasty!



Lemon Champagne Mousse

LEMON CURD
Ingredients:
5 lemons
5 limes
2 cups sugar
8 large egg yolks
2 whole eggs
1 ¾ sticks unsalted butter, cut into pieces

Instructions:
1. Place 1/2 cup lemon and 1/2lime juice, sugar egg yolks, whole eggs, and butter in a saucepan. Whisk until combined. Cook over medium heat, whisking constantly until it begins to boil (approx. 7 mins.).
2. Push curd through a chinois or strainer. Refrigerate for an hour or overnight.

CHAMPAGNE MOUSSE
Ingredients:
1 ¾ cups heavy whipping cream
3 tablespoon of champagne

Instructions:
1. Whip chilled heavy cream until it doubles in size and forms soft peaks.
2. Reserve ½ cup of lemon curd for sauce.
3. Add the champagne to the remaining curd and mix until incorporated.
4. Fold champagne and curd mixture into whipped cream.

CANDIED LEMONS
Ingredients:
3-4 lemons
3-4 limes
½ c lemon juice
½ c lime juice
2 c water
2 c sugar

Instructions:
1. Wash and scrub lemons and lime.
2. Cut into 1/8 inch slices.
2. Bring water and sugar to boil.
3. Gently lower lemon and slices into saucepot.
4. Lower heat to bring water to a simmer.
5. Cover top of water with parchement .
5. Continue to simmer until slices are translucent (approximately 25mins).

ASSEMBLY
1. Layer remaining lemon curd on top of mousse and garnish with candied lemons and a strawberry.

This one didn't turn out as well as I would have hoped, but it still tasted great. I'm glad I started early so that I could refrigerate the lemon curd, but it definitely needs more than an hour to become somewhat firm. After making the curd, I started on the candied lemons and limes. I followed the directions exactly, but for some reason, they didn't turn out. I pulled one out once they were done, and it tasted so bad, I had to spit it out in the trash. I will be looking into some other recipes to candy fruit.

Since the lemons and limes didn't turn out, I added some extra strawberries on top of the assembled product. This was actually really tasty - a good contrast between the sour of the mousse and sweet of the strawberries.


If you try any of the recipes I post on here, please let me know how they turn out for you and what changes you might make.