Recipe: Sensational Mango Dessert

Whoop up your summer several notches with Chef Ajay Thakur's Humari Mango Puri Karo.

It's the goodness of mango served in a bowl of creamy, smooth aam ras, with a scoop of mango mousse and mango ice cream, a slice of mango cheesecake and topped with mango barfi, aam papad and Mango Bite.

A real treat for the senses, it is every mango lover's dream come true.

Photograph: Kind courtesy Bayroute

Humari Mango Puri Karo

Serves: 3-4

Ingredients

50 gm aamras or mango puree
60 gm aamrakhand or mango mousse (recipe below)
95 gm mango cheesecake (recipe below)
30 gm mango ice cream

For the cheesecake

500 gm cream cheese
75 ml fresh cream
225 gm icing sugar
2 tsp vanilla essence
4 mangoes, chopped fine
3 gm corn flour
14-15 crackers or Marie biscuits
2-3 tbsp honey or melted butter + extra to butter the pan

For the aamrakhand or mango mousse

35 ml whipped cream
5 tbsp mango puree

To garnish

Chopped pistachios
4 Mango Bites candy
50 gm mango barfi, cut into small cubes
20 gm aam papad
2 mangoes, chopped fine
Silver vark

Method

To make the cheesecake

Break the biscuits and add them to a blender.
Blend till a coarse mixture of a fine consistency.
Add the melted butter or the honey and blend again.
Grease a cake pan or tart/pie pan with butter.
Transfer the biscuit mixture to the pan and with a spatula keep pressing down until it's a firm, even layer.
Refrigerate to set for 30 minutes.
In a bowl, mix together the cream cheese, icing sugar.
Add the vanilla essence, corn flour, fresh cream.
Mix well.
Add the chopped mangoes and lightly blend in.
Take out the layered cake pan from the fridge and transfer the cheesecake mango mixture into it.
Using a spatula, spread out the mixture evenly.
Refrigerate for 5-6 hours to set.

For the aamrakhand or mango mousse

In a bowl, mix the whipped cream and the mango puree.
Keep aside.

To assemble

In a big dessert bowl, place a slice of the mango cheesecake towards the side.
With the help of a tsp, make a circle around the cake with the mango mousse or better use a piping bag with a big nozzle (please see pic above).
Add a scoop of the remaining mousse on top of the cake and garnish with chopped pistachios and diced mangoes.
Add tiny artful scoops of mango mousse on the edges of the bowl and place the Mango Bites on top of it.
Place small pieces of barfiand aam papad on the edges to decorate the plate.
Add a scoop of mango ice cream on the side.
Pour the aamras in the centre and garnish the dessert with silver vark.
Serve immediately.

Note: To make this dessert vegan, pare it down a bit -- skip the mango ice cream, mango mousse and the mango barfi. And fill the pie crust with fresh mango fruit instead of the cheesecake mixture. Alternately instead of adding cream to the mango mousse use thickened coconut cream.

Similarly to make it sugar free, don't use mango ice cream, Mango Bites, aam papad, mango barfi. Substitute the icing sugar with stevia powder. Each brand of stevia has its own stevia for sugar substitution ratio provided on its packing.

Chef Ajay Thakur is the corporate chef at Bayroute, a restaurant in Mumbai.