Hello Listserve-Members,
As I was a (very) little girl I used to think that there were little elves in our dishwasher who made all the washing, cleaning and drying.
I imagined them with small water hoses, tiny sponges and towels, running around the dirty dishes, climbing above the plates and the glasses, rinsing and scrubbing.
Once during a winter I had catched a cold and coughed a lot and our dishwasher started in the same time to make some strange noises. It wasn’t only the normal splashing of water, but a sort of jerky drumming and it sounded to me like a cough. Obviously the elves were also sick.
I wanted to help them so I took my bottle of cough medicine (a thick and delicious caramel tasting syrup) and emptied a large part of it in the dishwasher in the hole where the rinse aid belongs.
In a fairy world, the strange noise would have disappeared. But our dishwasher definitely failed a few days later.
Fortunately my parents didn’t notice my attempt to heal it. The old dishwasher went away, a new one came and the man who brought it exactly described how it worked : the End of the Elves.
Now I’m the mother of a two years old and I’m already curious about the kind of tales he’s going to create for himself.
And case there’s not enough chocolate in your life a few weeks for Christmas, I give you the ultimate recipe for the “Mousse au chocolat de Tante Danièle” (Aunt Danièle’s chocolate mousse. I’m French, so my aunt, so this mousse au chocolat… and the reason for my bad English).
You need for 8 persons: 8 (really really fresh) eggs, 1 cup sugar (200 g), 1 cup butter (250g), 14 oz. dark chocolate (400g)
Let the chocolate melt slowly with the butter and let cool. Separate the egg whites from the yolks. Mix the yolks and sugar until the mixture is pale and thick. Add the melted chocolate and mix. Whisk the egg whites until really stiff (you can add a little pinch of salt, it helps). Fold the egg whites gently into the mixture. Put in the fridge for 4 hours at least. And eat within 24 hours (because of the raw eggs).
If you use icing sugar instead of normal sugar, you’ll have a “marquise au chocolat”. It’s even better.
Thank you for reading. I would enjoy hearing about you, your own childhood tales and your favorite recipes.
Have a nice day.
Hélène H.
[email protected]
Germany