French home ec

The year I met my husband is a year rich with memories. We were both serving as foreign language assistants for the French Ministry of Education, there to both help teachers and improve our French. Bourges was and is a small town at heart, and many families opened their doors to us as a group and individually. One family in particular delighted us with multiple invitations, to dinner, to a road rally, archery competition, and just to hang out. They had a son who was being forced to take the French version of Home Economics. In this country, there's one day in the life of the high schooler that stands out for the inviting odor. It's the day when Home Ec students make brownies. I'm pretty sure the teacher did this to ingratiate themself with the students--and it worked. (True confession here: I didn't take Home Ec, but managed to convince my counselor that wood shop was for me. I already knew how to make brownies, I wanted to learn about power tools.)

At any rate, this French teenager by came home with a recipe for the French equivalent of brownies, mousse au chocolat. My dear husband (well, just boyfriend at the time) just couldn't believe you could make it with just three ingredients: sugar, eggs and chocolate. So, he snagged the boy, and they hunkered down in the kitchen to make it together. We were treated to a yummy mousse for supper.

A few years later, living in a tiny student apartment in Freiburg, the light of my life pulled out that recipe and made it for me again. This was probably the moment I realized he was a keeper, so I kept him. That old ragged recipe has pulled him out of many a tight spot since then, making him shine in both my eyes and those of my mother and my girlfriends.

Alas, he found himself in such a position earlier this year, but stopped short: I wasn't eating eggs. How could he make mousse without eggs? Not for him those pseudo-mousses, relying on gelatin or whipped cream for their light fluffy texture. He is a purist.

Well, we think we've found a suitable ersatz, in the unlikely guise of tofu. Yup, tofu. Inspired by the little tub in the deli case at the co-op, I whizzed up some tofu and chocolate last night. A dash of vanilla extract helped, though I'm pretty sure some Grand Marnier would have really helped. All told, I probably need to experiment a bit with brands of both tofu and chocolate (the flavor of the chocolate seems to some through more strongly without the interference of sugar), but we were quite satisfied, after exhaustive research, including highly scientific double blind testing.