Get ready for the richest, creamiest, most indulgent vegan chocolate mousse ever! This delicious dairy-free mousse will blow your mind. The best part? It whips up in minutes and requires only 6 ingredients!
One would think vegan mousse would be a difficult thing to make. I mean, conventional mousses are made from both eggs and whipped cream. The eggs and cream are what give most mousses their characteristic light and fluffy texture.
Replicating that with vegan ingredients must be tough, right? Well guess what? It's not!
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In fact, making eggless and dairy-free mousse is pretty simple. The magic ingredient is coconut cream! It works great in desserts like my vegan coconut cream pie and vegan tiramisu, and it makes an amazing vegan chocolate mousse as well. Coconut cream gives you all the richness of heavy cream, and it's great at trapping air bubbles.
As a total chocoholic who has already created recipes for vegan chocolate cake, vegan chocolate torte, and vegan hot chocolate, I decided it was time to get cracking on vegan chocolate mousse — with coconut cream as the star ingredient. And guess what? It worked out great! I can say with absolute certainty that this vegan chocolate mousse is as good as the real deal. Maybe better!
Ingredients You'll Need
Below you'll find a list of ingredients in this recipe, with notes and substitutions. Scroll all the way to the bottom of the post to see the full recipe, including the amount of each ingredient.
- Vegan chocolate chips. I used Enjoy Life brand, which is available at many supermarkets.
- Coconut cream. Lots of stores sell this in cans, near the coconut milk. If you can't find it, buy a couple of cans of full-fat coconut milk instead, chill them in the fridge for about a day, then take them out and let them come up to room temperature. Open them up and drain the water. What's left in the can will be coconut cream. You'll need 1 ¾ cups of it.
- Cocoa powder.
- Powdered sugar. Make sure to buy organic powdered sugar in order to keep the recipe vegan.
- Vanilla extract.
- Salt.
How It's Made
Below is a detailed photo tutorial on how to make this dish. Scroll all the way down if you'd like to skip right to the recipe!
Step 1: Melt your vegan chocolate chips. The easiest way to do this is by placing them into a bowl and microwaving them in 30-second increments, stirring vigorously between zaps. Be sure not to overheat them.
Step 2: Prepare the coconut cream. Scoop your coconut cream into a large mixing bowl. Be sure to include just the cream — any liquid in the can should be discarded or used for another purpose.
Tip: Your coconut cream should be at room temperature before using it. Chilling it to help separation is fine — just remember to take it out of the fridge several hours ahead. If it’s too cold, the chocolate may harden and create little chunks. If it’s too warm, it won’t whip up fluffy.
Step 3: Whip the coconut cream. Use an electric mixer or stand mixer on high speed to beat the coconut cream until fluffy. This should only take a minute or so.
Step 4: Add dry ingredients. Beat the cocoa powder, powdered sugar, and salt, along with the vanilla.
Step 5: Add chocolate. Begin drizzling in the melted chocolate. Continue beating the mixture until everything is combined.
Step 6: Chill. Divide your vegan chocolate mousse into serving containers. Cover them up and stick them in the fridge until thoroughly chilled.
Step 7: Serve. Uncover, top your mousse cups if desired, and enjoy!
Tip: If you love this, but aren't in the mood for chocolate (I guess that happens), give my vegan lemon mousse a try.
Frequently Asked Questions
It is!
Try dairy free whipped cream (such as Reddi-Wip almond milk whipped topping), fresh berries, chocolate sauce, or chocolate shavings.
I'm afraid there's no direct substitute for the coconut cream in this recipe, but you may want to give my vegan chocolate pudding a try. It's very fluffy, like a mousse, and the main ingredient is silken tofu.
Store leftover mousse in sealed containers and it will keep in the refrigerator for about 4 to 6 days. This recipe isn't freezer-friendly.
Unfortunately, no. Anything other than coconut cream or full-fat coconut milk will not separate and give you the fatty coconut solids that whip up and get creamy to create the base for this mousse.
More Vegan Chocolate Recipes
Like this recipe? If so, please stop back and leave me a review and rating below if you try it! Also be sure to follow me on Facebook, Pinterest or Instagram, or subscribe to my newsletter for more recipes like this one!
📖 Recipe
The Best Vegan Chocolate Mousse
Ingredients
- â…“ cup vegan chocolate chips
- 1 (14-ounce/400 gram) can coconut cream (Notes 1 and 2), at room temperature (Note 3)
- ¼ cup cocoa powder
- 3 tablespoons organic powdered sugar
- ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract
- Pinch salt
Instructions
- Place the chocolate chips into a medium-sized microwave-safe bowl and microwave them in 30-second increments, stirring between each round, just until melted. Do not overheat.
- Open the can of coconut cream and scoop out the solids only, then transfer them to a large mixing bowl. Discard any liquid.
- Beat the coconut cream on high speed with an electric mixer until fluffy and creamy, about 1 minute.
- Add the cocoa powder, powdered sugar, vanilla, and salt. Beat again until everything is fully combined and smooth.
- Drizzle in the melted chocolate and quickly beat it in. Continue beating until the mixture is fully combined.
- Transfer the mousse to serving cups and cover them tightly. Refrigerate until chilled and set, or ready to serve.
- Top your mousse with toppings of choice and serve.
Notes
- Use a brand of coconut cream that contains no stabilizers or emulsifiers. Ingredients to watch out for include guar gum, xanthan gum, carrageenan, locust bean gum (carob bean gum), gellan gum, mono- and diglycerides, polysorbate 60, and sodium carboxymethyl cellulose (cellulose gum). These additives can prevent the cream from separating or whipping properly. Thai Kitchen and Wegmans brands both work well. I’ve also heard from readers that Trader Joe’s coconut cream does not perform reliably in recipes like this.
- If you can't find coconut cream, buy a couple cans of full-fat coconut milk, chill in the fridge for 12 hours, then take them out and let them come back up to room temperature. Open them and drain off the liquid that has separated out. The remaining solids are coconut cream. You'll need about 1 ¾ cups.
- Your coconut cream needs to have separated from any liquid in the can, while still being soft enough to whip. This will usually happen at room temperature, but it's a good idea to check a day before getting started. The day before making this, shake the can. If you feel liquid sloshing, it has not separated. You can chill the coconut cream for up to 12 hours to help it separate, but don’t chill it much longer than that or it may become very firm and difficult to whip.
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This recipe is a straight up scam. Whipped the coconut cream for 10 minutes and it was still runny. All these positive comments have to be either bought or from the author who is leaving them from dead accounts, or she’s deleting any negative comments. Scam!!!!
If it was runny then something went wrong. My guess is that it was warmer than room temperature, given the time of year. Is it warm in your kitchen? Check out the photo tutorial in the blog post to get an idea of what things should look like when you make this.
Hi! How long should this chill in the fridge before serving? It looks amazing!
I generally give it about two hours, as long as it's in individual serving cups. If you're chilling the whole batch in one container it could take up to four hours. Enjoy!
Thank you so much. We just finished devouring it and it was delicious!
My son and I just made this and we had so much fun both making it and picking toppings to put on our chocolate mousse (caramel, raspberries and more oat milk chocolate chips was the favorite combo). It was literally the BEST chocolate mousse we ever had and we ate it way too fast. We will be making again- thank you!
Yay!! I'm so glad you both enjoyed it! That really does sound like a delicious combination. Thanks so much Kristin!
This is amazing!
I think so! You might need a few extra minutes of blend time go get it fully dissolved. :)
I tried with granulated sugar and coconut milk and now my life is complete. I've been looking for a thick mousse for ages and this is just perfect. Thank you for the recipe!
I'm glad to hear it! Thanks so much for stopping back to let me know!
Cannot wait to make this! It's so simple and looks literally like mousse.
I am going to try adding avocado to it to make it richer for a boost of extra healthy goodies!
Thank you for the recipe!!
I've made mousse with just avocado as a base before and I think the combination would be awesome! Enjoy!
Made this tonight and my four year old devoured it!
Yes! I knew this one would be a winner with the kids! Thanks for sharing :)
How many servings should this make? I mean, I know it could probably be just one serving, but if we're trying to be reasonable and not eat a pound of chocolate mousse all at once...
Ha! Yeah, one serving is a definite possibility, but if you're being reasonable you should get about six normal-sized servings out of this recipe.
I know exactly what you mean. I had to stop myself from "taste testing" because it started to look like I wasn't going to have enough to frost the entire batch of cupcakes!
Mmmm! I make a similar version of this and it never seems to last for more than a day. I have all these good intentions and ideas for what I want to try with it but I just end up going to town on it with a spoon! Yummy stuff!