Mascarpone dessert with raspberries: a cream in twenty minutes, no baking
Mascarpone loosened with a spatula and folded into cream whipped to soft peaks, with icing sugar and lemon zest. Only the cream goes under the mixer, and only briefly; the mascarpone is loosened with a spatula, because at around forty per cent fat it splits into grains that cannot be brought back if beaten too long. Layered in glasses with raspberries and crushed biscuits, an hour in the fridge, and a dessert for guests is done.
Your own work in that: 20 min.
- Cream 10 min
- Layers 10 min
- Chilling 60 min
Step by step
0 / 6 doneLoosen the mascarpone
Put the cold mascarpone in a bowl and work it with a spatula for half a minute, until smooth and glossy. Stir in the lemon zest and vanilla sugar. Don't reach for the mixer yet.
Ingredients: 250 g mascarpone · 200 ml whipping cream (30%) · 60 g icing sugar · 1 tbsp vanilla sugar · 1 pcs lemon, zest
TipMascarpone straight from the fridge is dense and lumpy; beaten in that state with a mixer it breaks apart before it can combine with the cream. Half a minute with a spatula prevents a fault that cannot be undone later.
Spatula, until smooth, no mixerWhip the cream to soft peaks
In a second, chilled bowl whip the very cold cream with the icing sugar 2 minutes on medium speed, to soft peaks: the lifted whisk leaves a tip that folds over. Stop there.
Ingredients: 250 g mascarpone · 200 ml whipping cream (30%) · 60 g icing sugar · 1 tbsp vanilla sugar · 1 pcs lemon, zest
TipCream and mascarpone are whipped separately because they need completely different times. Beaten together they are easy to overdo: before the cream has gained volume, the mascarpone may already have split.
Two minutes, the tip folds overFold them together
Stir a third of the whipped cream briskly into the mascarpone to slacken it, then fold in the rest from the bottom up, in a dozen or so calm strokes. The cream should be thick, smooth and slightly glossy.
TipThat first portion of cream evens out the density of the two mixtures. Added all at once you would have to fold for longer, and every extra stroke knocks out air and takes the mascarpone a step closer to splitting.
Prepare the fruit and biscuits
Pick over the raspberries and set half aside whole for the top and use the rest in the layers. Put the biscuits in a bag and crush them with a rolling pin into coarse crumbs, not dust.
Ingredients: 250 g raspberries · 80 g plain biscuits · 1 tbsp icing sugar
Half the raspberries for the top, coarse crumbsBuild the layers
Into four glasses spoon, in order: biscuit crumbs, cream, raspberries, cream. The cream is easiest to pipe from a bag with the corner cut off, guided against the inside of the glass. Press a few raspberries to the wall so they show.
Biscuits, cream, raspberries, creamChill for an hour and serve
Refrigerate 60 minutes: the cream firms up and the biscuits at the bottom soften into it. Just before serving arrange the reserved raspberries on top and dust with icing sugar. The dessert keeps 2 days in the fridge, but always add the top fruit fresh.
An hour, then raspberries and icing sugar
Before you start
With peaches and caramel
Drained tinned peaches in dice instead of raspberries, and a spoon of dulce de leche between the layers. The sweeter, wintry version for when there is no fresh fruit.
The cream split
Split mascarpone is fat that has come out of the emulsion, and it cannot be whipped back. Don't throw it away: fold in 2–3 spoons of very cold cream very slowly with a spatula, and if that fails use the mixture as a crepe filling or the base of a no-bake cheesecake.
Less sweet
Cut the icing sugar to 40 g and add a spoon of lemon juice. The cream reads lighter and copes better with very sweet fruit such as ripe peaches or strawberries.
