The Bombe

My future mother-in-law loves chocolate. Not chocolate with lots of other flavors. She loves just the pure, unabashed, real thing. And so we decided to make her the dessert with which I won the heart of my fiance. The dish my mother always made for true chocolate lovers. Julia Child's stunning Bombe aux Trois Chocolat.

It is a molded dessert, and contains chocolate three ways. First is what Julia calls a cake, I think it's more like a fudgy brownie. The layer creates the shape and structure of the dish, encasing a chocolate mousse. The whole thing is refrigerated and then un-molded and drizzled with a combination of bitter and semi-sweet chocolate. The result is just fantastic.

The perfect bite includes bits of all three layers: the hardness of the pure melted chocolate, the fudginess of the cake, and the smoothness of mousse. Just the difference in textures tantalize the palate, not to mention the contrast between the density of the cake and airiness of the mousse. For chocolate lovers, this really is the ultimate in the chocolate experiences.