If you wait for everything to be perfect before you start, you’ll never start. So get starting.
That’s the motto I’m rolling with on this Saturday evening. Trying to bring some “can do” energy in my quest to upload my huge backlog of recipes to the blog.
Take this cheat’s tiramisu for example. I made this for Mum recently, her describing it as “the best tiramisu I’ve ever tasted”. How flattering to hear. I did have a chuckle with my sister Ali afterwards though when she asked how the tiramisu turned out, hearing the tremendous feedback. “Oh hang on- I make tiramisu for Mum all the time” she laughed with a mocked hurt tone of voice.
I call it my “cheat’s” tiramisu because it uses store bought Italian Lady Finger meringue like biscuits as opposed to making a sponge. I like to put a generous splash of Kahlua (a coffee liqueur) in with the coffee but feel free to use Bailey’s, Tia Maria, Frangelico or Marsala (a fortified wine) if you prefer. By all means leave the liquor out if you like. If you do that, you can add a teaspoon of almond essence instead. I think I favour Kahlua because we always seem to have it in the house after Cork Daddy and I recently discovered a love of making Espresso martini’s at home.
It wouldn’t be right to post this recipe too without crediting a couple of people who have helped me fine tune my recipe. Firstly, credit needs to go to Rick Stein who’s recipe I used the very first time I made tiramisu many moons ago after watching him on telly.
Secondly, I’ve learnt from the Italian Food Safari -their tip on mixing the yolks and sugar until really nice and pale, almost white, is something I’ll never forget. And would you believe that the other main inspiration behind this recipe is actually from the side of the Dolce Verona Savoiardi (Lady finger) biscuit packet that you buy from Woolies. They say to use 3 – 4 eggs to 250 grams of mascarpone, I favour using 4.
Oh and my sister Casey loves Nagi’s recipe which I’ve also studied and can be found here. All of us small time food bloggers may as well just give up. The videos on the Recipe Tin Eats website are just too good!
Real tiramisu doesn’t have cream in it. I guess in the same way their pizza doesn’t have pineapple on it. Authentic Italian tiramisu uses mascarpone cheese and eggs alone, a bit of sugar, strong coffee, spongey layers and a generous dusting of cocoa. Rick adds vanilla though, so I do that too. One mustn’t argue with the master.
You can also replace the cocoa with grated chocolate if you prefer and go ahead and make them individually sized if that’s what floats your boat.
But enough rattling on, let’s get cooking.
cheat’s tiramisu
You’ll want to use a shallow casserole dish for this recipe but I also like to make it in those smaller al foil trays (this recipe is enough to make two) to give as gifts as well.
The beauty of this dessert is that you can make it ahead of time. This is best made the day before you want to serve it – allowing the sponge fingers time to fully soak up the flavours of both the coffee and alcohol.
You can also use hand held beaters instead if a stand mixer isn’t an option. Make yourself a coffee to sip on whilst standing there whisking as it’ll take a bit of time.
4 x small eggs, separated
1/2 a cup of white sugar
250 grams of mascarpone cheese
1 x teaspoon of vanilla extract
1 x packet of 24 Lady Fingers/Savoiardi biscuits (these Italian store bought sponge biscuits are the same thing and can be picked up at most supermarkets these days)
1 x cup of very strong black coffee
A good splash of Kahlua, Tia Maria, Frangelico or Marsala wine (similarly, if you want to omit the alcohol, you can add a dash of almond essence)
A couple of tablespoons of cocoa, for sifting over the top
- Put your coffee on, whether you’re using instant coffee granules, a pod machine, a stovetop percolator or an espresso machine. You’ll need approximately 1 x good cup of really strong coffee.
- Meanwhile, seperate your eggs, placing the yolks into the large bowl of your stand mixer, reserving the whites.
- Add the sugar to the yolks and beat on a high speed for a good 5-8 minutes until it becomes nicely creamy and really pale in colour.
- Add the mascarpone cheese and vanilla and continue to beat until just combined. Set this aside.
- It’s now time to beat your egg whites until you’ve formed stiff peaks (it’s handy here if you’re lucky enough to have a second bowl for your stand mixer to save you having to faff around with decanting the yolk mixture into another bowl).
- In two batches, gently fold the egg whites into the egg yolks using a spatula until just combined.
- Add the kahlua to the coffee and get your casserole dish and lady finger biscuits ready to assemble.
- Now we’re going to create two layers here – dip the biscuits into the coffee, turning quickly in the liquid so that they become coated in the coffee (but bear in mind that the biscuit soaks up the coffee really quickly and will fall apart if you’re too slow) and line them up so that the base of the dish is covered.
- Using half of the creamy mascarpone/egg mixture, spread it out over the biscuits and then repeat with another layer of the coffee dunked biscuits and then finishing it off with the rest of the mascarpone mixture. So starting on the bottom – we’ve got biscuits, creamy mixture, biscuits, creamy mixture.
- Place in the fridge for at least 4 hours or ideally, overnight, to set.
- Dust the top of the tiramisu in a generous sprinkling of sifted cocoa. Enjoy.
If you make this tiramisu I’d love to hear your thoughts. Please feel free to comment below.
lo's kitchen 
Maybe if I use your recipe Mum will love mine too!!! 🤣
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