Vegan Lemon Mousse
I’m so proud of my little experiment!!! If you’re in love with lemon and you’re craving something refreshing … you landed on the right page!
Here’s how this lemon mousse was born and conceived: no gelatin, no refined sugars, no oils, no eggs or dairy (it’s vegan!), no food coloring … yes, it’s totally possible!
I have been craving a refreshing dessert recently and all I could think of – as an alternative to my beloved ice-cream – was a mousse!
Both for ice-cream and mousse I’ve always been sticking to chocolate, since I’m a chocolate addict: but sometimes also chocolate addicts need something different… and when it’s not chocolate, gotta be lemon!!
I usually make my chocolate mousse with avocado but I wouldn’t want to use it for a lemon mousse too … so I started thinking of what else I could use, instead of avocado, that could keep my mousse thick, creamy and smooth. I searched here and there for recipes and I was noticing how almost everyone was using either gelatin or some other kinds of thickeners that for me were not an option. If you know me, you know I always stick to ingredients as natural as possible. This is where the idea of using coconut yogurt came from: 90% of the plant-based yogurts on sale already have some thickeners of their own (this is why I am not eating them on a daily basis) so I thought the yogurt would do its part! I just tried to choose the one with the least amount of thickeners and SO DELICIOUS was the one!
Since I decided to make my mousse vegan and was going to use coconut milk, I opted for coconut yogurt. I used SO DELICIOUS brand and picked the vanilla flavor, with no added sugars. It’s fine to use any other plant-based yogurt (preferably plain or vanilla or maybe lemon flavor) but I wanted to keep it “one way” and go all in with coconut!
As for the turmeric … don’t worry, you won’t taste it at all! I wanted to make my mousse with 2 different color layers but I would NEVER use food coloring so I looked around in my kitchen and my eyes fell on this amazing spice: the only challenge was to find out how much turmeric I could add to give the mousse some color WITHOUT leaving any trace of flavor. I added it a bit at a time and – to cover it up even better – I decided to add a bit more essential oil.
Worked PERFECTLY!!!
A few notes on the coconut milk, which was the first ingredient that popped up in my head when I thought of a mousse:
- Be sure to use full fat milk, NOT a light version (or you won’t have a creamy and thick mousse) and has to be milk from a can.
- It is essential that you place your coconut milk can in the fridge for at least 10~12 hours: I would suggest refrigerating it the day before you want to make the mousse.
- Do NOT shake the can either before or after the refrigeration: the reason why we are putting the can in the fridge is to allow the creamy/fatty part of the coconut to separate from the water (naturally contained in the coconut). When you open the can after the refrigeration, you’ll see this white and creamy part sitting on top of the water layer (which is on the bottom) and you will want to remove it from the can with a spoon. Since we are not using any thickeners or gelatin, you’ll want to only keep the thick and creamy part of the coconut milk.
- I personally do not like the coconut water out of the canned coconut milk so I throw it away, but for those who want to keep it, you can try and use it in a shake. Drinking it by itself is not as good as the coconut water sold in cartons at the grocery stores
Get your ingredients ready and let’s start – no worries, you won’t need to turn on your oven, there’s nothing to cook here!!
Servings |
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- 1 can full fat coconut milk, refrigerated (fat portion only)
- 1 cup coconut yogurt (vanilla or plain, no sugar added)
- 1/4 cup maple syrup
- 1/4 cup Lemon juice
- 8 drops DoTerra Lemon EO
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/4 tsp turmeric powder
Ingredients
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- First of all, refrigerate your coconut milk can for at least 10~12 hours (plan on doing this the day before you prepare the mousse). Remove it from the fridge and open it without shaking it. You’ll find that all of the creamy and fatty part of coconut is concentrated on the very top of the can and you will ONLY use this portion.
- Gently scoop it out of the can with a spoon and place in a large and tall bowl.
- Add the coconut yogurt, lemon juice, vanilla extract and only 5 drops of the essential oil and start beating with electric whisk for a good 5~10 minutes, until the mousse becomes fluffy.
- Divide the mousse into 2 equal portions: half will remain in the bowl, the other half can be equally distributed into single-serving glasses. Just to give you an idea, I put about 3 full spoons of this white mousse on the bottom of each of the 5 single-serving glasses I had (if you’re putting your mousse in 1 large container, the you just put the whole half in it).
- Add the turmeric and the remaining 3 drops of lemon essential oil into the mousse that stayed in the bowl and beat with electric whisk for another 3 minutes or so. At this point, you’ll see your mousse will be of a yellowish color: you’ll then distribute this second half on top of the white part.
- Decorate as you wish, I used some of the lemon peel for decoration purposes only.
- Store in the fridge, possibly with some plastic wrap on top of each glass/the container: this will avoid the top of the mousse to harden.
- You may want to try and freeze some of it, I’m sure it would be great too as a refreshing sorbet!