Craving something light and tasty, try this creamy ricotta chocolate mousse. Reminiscent of the filling from a cannoli, it’s chocolatey but not too sweet. This is a very simple and easy recipe. With so few ingredients, they need to be top quality. When purchasing chocolate for cooking and baking, look for bars with about 60 percent cocoa solids. It’s so good you’ll want to eat this mousse right out of the mixing bowl, but it can be chilled before serving. A food processor will make this mousse smooth, but I used a hand mixer and kept it chunky.

• 15 ounce container part-skim ricotta cheese
• 2 tablespoons confectioners’ sugar
• 4 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
• 1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Carefully melt the chopped chocolate in the microwave or in a double boiler and let it cool. Combine the ricotta cheese, sugar, melted (cooled) chocolate, cocoa powder and vanilla in the bowl of a food processor. Blend the ingredients until smooth. Garnish with chocolate shavings. The mousse can be refrigerated for up to 2 days. Serves 4.