A Taste of Italy: Tiramisu

Last year I went to Italy for 2 1/2 weeks. It was a fabulous trip and one of my favorite things that we did was a cooking class in Florence. We made Tagliatelle and Ravioli pasta from scratch as well as a Bolognese sauce, Butter and Sage sauce, and Tiramisu. I quite enjoyed learning how to make pasta from scratch, but I have made the Tiramisu more than the other recipes...maybe because it's so easy. Tiramisu is an Italian dessert that literally means "pick me up" and gets it's name from the small amount of caffeine found in the coffee and cocoa that is in the dessert.

Well, tonight a friend of mine and I broke out my recipe for Tiramisu and I thought I would share it.

Ingredients include 4 eggs (room temperature), 1 lb. Mascarpone cheese (room temperature), 24 small Lady Fingers, 12 spoons of sugar, 6-7 Tbs. unsweetened cocoa powder, 1 cup black coffee.

First, separate the egg yolks and whites into 2 separate bowls. Be sure that none of the yolk mixes with the whites. You can do this by moving the egg yolk from hand to hand and letting the egg white drip into the bowl. 

Combine the sugar with the yolks and mix until creamy. 

Then fold the cheese into the yolk mixture.

Whisk whites until soft peaks form. You may want to use a hand mixer for faster results. The peaks should be formed so that if you turned the bowl upside down, they would not fall or move.

Fold the egg whites into yolk and cheese mixture. 

Dip the cookies into the coffee one at a time.

Spread a layer of cream into chosen serving dish. Layer with cocoa and cookies. Layer again with cream. Keep going until everything is used up ending with cream on top. 

Dust with cocoa powder until covered. Add chocolate chips if desired. Chill 2 hours in the refrigerator. Keeps 1-2 days (no more than 2 days because of the raw eggs). Recipe makes 6 servings.

Bon Appetit!