Dutch Pancake with Vanila Mousse and Cucumber, Grape Fruit Salad

Directions

1. This mousse is a quite sweet if you eat it on its own but when paired with the dutch pancake and fruit salad it replaces syrup on the pancake and provides the much needed sweetness to go with the grape fruit. A mousse is a dessert that is made fluffy with the addition of whipped cream, egg whites or both. Simply make a crème patisserie which is stirred custard, start by boiling your milk, sugar, and vanilla bean pods and the scraped out innards in a sauce pan. Mix together the cornstarch and eggs until the mixture is free of lumps, temper the egg mixture into the hot milk and return to medium heat cook stirring continuously until the mixture thickens, remove from heat immediately add the butter and place in a shallow container in the refrigerator with plastic wrap on the surface of the pastry cream . For the meringue portion of the mousse separate your eggs and warm the egg whites in a hot water bath once the egg whites are warm add a little lemon juice which breaks down the protein in the egg whites there by making your job easier. Whip the egg whites until they form a soft peak then gradually add the sugar to the meringue being sure to continually whisk. Continue to whip until stiff peaks are formed set this aside and then whip the cream to soft peak. Fold your meringue into the cooled pastry cream and then do the same with the whipped cream and your mousse is now complete.
2. For those of you who have not had a Dutch pancake before it is a simple physically leavened pancake that is baked. Pre heat your oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit and beat your eggs over a hot water bath until frothy, you want the water to be hot but not boiling or you will cook your eggs. Fold in the rest of your ingredients and deposit the batter into a lightly oiled 6” cast iron skillet. Cut the honey dew into quarters and remove the rind and seeds, slice one of the quarters into thin slices and arrange into a spiral on the pancake. Bake the pancake for 15 minutes then drizzle it with honey and continue baking for 5 minutes or until evenly browned.
3. For those of you who have not had a Dutch pancake before it is a simple physically leavened pancake that is baked. Pre heat your oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit and beat your eggs over a hot water bath until frothy, you want the water to be hot but not boiling or you will cook your eggs. Fold in the rest of your ingredients and deposit the batter into a lightly oiled 6” cast iron skillet. Cut the pear into quarters and remove the core, slice one of the quarters into thin slices and arrange into a spiral on the pancake. Bake the pancake for 15 minutes then drizzle it with honey and continue baking for 5 minutes or until evenly browned.
4. The fruit salad is pretty self explanatory cut up your fruit into 2 centimetre cubes except the grape fruit should be cut into smaller 1 centimetre pieces otherwise it over whelms the other fruits. Make sure that you have properly segmented the grape fruit and that there is no skin left, this is easy to do with grape fruits because the wedges are so big. Use a sharp knife and cut the peel off of the grapefruit and cut along the membrane, separating the flesh from the membrane, continue doing this until you have segmented the whole grapefruit.
5. To assemble this dessert I like to serve the fruit salad and mousse in a glass with a spoon for aesthetic reasons. I either dip my pancake in the mousse or spoon some of the mousse onto the pancake but if you prefer you can serve everything directly on top of the pancake.