I’ve been a tiramisu fan for quite some time, but I can’t say I’ve never met a tiramisu I didn’t like. My main complaint with tiramisu is that it is often overloaded with sugar. I have a sweet tooth (I promise), but sweetness is not the only component of a great dessert.
This recipe was a challenge for me on many counts. I had never made the ladyfingers or mascarpone in this recipe and have little experience with piping. Moreover, tiramisu has only a few key ingredients (sugar, cream, coffee, wine), and each of those is as likely as the other to usurp complete control of the dessert if you let it. I was excited about the chance to create a version of this favorite dessert with new flavors. Making tiramisu components from scratch enabled me to knock down the sugar, a dietary and taste preference that is also responsible for why you’re not seeing the pastry cream component like you would in most other Daring Bakers’ versions.
I love tiramisu’s traditional coffee and marsala flavors but I wanted to veer just a few degrees off. So I coated my ladyfingers with coffee and hazelnut liquor and I flavored the mascarpone with Rainwater Madeira, which if you’ve never tried, is a soft, semi-sweet aperitif that I find complements many kinds of desserts. The natural nuttiness in the Madeira coupled with the lush sweetness of the hazelnut liquor makes for a flavor-balanced pairing.
During the creation of this recipe, I also discovered a new sugar. I had recently purchased cane juice sugar, similar in taste to jaggery, but in granulated form rather than in a block. On a whim, I decided to substitute this for the whole cane sugar I would normally use, and I’m so glad I did. The cane juice sugar doesn’t have the assertive flavor of maple that one expects from whole cane sugar, formerly known as “Rapadura.” It does not cause a burn in your throat, nor does it have the sharp taste of white sugar. Instead, the cane juice sugar lends a subtle caramel sweetness that works amazingly well with the combination of hazelnut and Madeira.
When I cooked the mascarpone, it felt more like an exercise in intuition than a science. I was so disappointed with the technical aspect of my initial mascarpone run that I thought I’d repeat the challenge for sanity’s sake and see if I could fix some of the previous mistakes. This also enabled me to make another batch, which ended up being a good idea since I would need to double the volume anyway in order to replace the pastry cream component. Making your own mascarpone will save you loads of money if you need a large quantity of it, which most tiramisu recipes require. For that reason alone, I’m now a convert to and advocate of homemade versions. Also, it’s just so good!
Preparing each component is not particularly time consuming, but it is spread over the course of 3-4 days, so plan accordingly if you want to serve this for a party.
hazelnut rainwater madeira tiramisu
makes 9 servings in a 8″x8″ square pan
day 1: ladyfingers
makes 25-45 ladyfingers, depending on how large you pipe them
3 eggs, separated
6 tbsp white sugar
3/4 cup cake flour, sifted (or 3/4 cup all purpose flour + 2 tbsp corn starch)
6 tablespoons confectioner’s sugar
Preheat your oven to 350º degrees. Coat 2 baking sheets with drops of oil or butter and line them with parchment paper.
Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form. Gradually add granulated sugar and continue beating until the egg whites become stiff, glossy and smooth.
In a small bowl, beat the egg yolks until they increase in volume. Sift the flour over the eggs and fold gently until just mixed. Do not overmix as it can deflate the batter resulting in flat ladyfingers. Fold the egg-yolk batter gently into the egg-white batter and mix just enough to incorporate.
Fit a plain tip into a pastry or ziploc bag and fill with the batter. (Full disclosure: my piping skills are sorely lacking so I gently doled out the batter with a spoon.) Before you pipe the batter, you should know what pan or shape you’d like your tiramisu to have. Is it square, round, or individual, and how high is the pan? Do you want the fingers on the outside or as soaking biscuits inside only, and do you want any leftovers for dipping into coffee? Once you have the measurement and approximate length of each, start piping the fingers onto the parchment paper.
Sprinkle half the confectioner’s sugar over the ladyfingers and wait for a few minutes. Then sprinkle with sugar again. This helps give the ladyfingers their characteristic crispness. Tap the baking sheet lightly to remove any excess sugar.
Bake the ladyfingers for 10 minutes, then rotate the sheets and bake for another 5 minutes or so until they puff up, turn lightly golden brown, and are still soft. I suggest putting as many ladyfingers as you can into the oven at once as the batter that waits at room temperature will deflate over time as well.
Allow the fingers to cool slightly on the sheets for about 5 minutes, then remove them from the sheet to cool on a rack. They will keep stored in an airtight container for 2 to 3 weeks.
day 2: mascarpone cheese
makes 2 cups
4 cups cream* (heavy or whipping, single or ultra pasteurized)
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
Boil water in a pot (or use a double boiler) and then reduce the heat to medium-low. Pour the cream into a metal bowl and place over your pot. Heat the cream, stirring often until it reaches 190ºF. This should take about about 15-20 minutes. Once it reaches this temperature, add the lemon juice and continue heating on low, stirring every once in a while. The cream will start becoming thicker as you continue stirring. After 20 minutes of stirring, it should coat the back of your wooden spoon like a thick crème anglaise.
Remove the bowl from the water and let it cool for at least 20 minutes. Line a mesh colander or sieve with a damp, lint free kitchen towel (if you use cheesecloth, use 12 layers of dampened cheesecloth) and set it over a bowl. Transfer the mixture into the damp towel. Do not squeeze the cheese in the cheesecloth or press on its surface. If the mixture is dripping heavily, you will need more layers below. Once cooled completely, cover it with plastic wrap and refrigerate (in the sieve) overnight or up to 24 hours. Keep your mascarpone refrigerated and use within 3 to 4 days.
day 2: zabaglione
3 large egg yolks
8 tbsp cane juice sugar
1/3 cup Rainwater Madeira wine
Place a pot with about an inch of water in it (or use a double boiler) on the stove over medium low heat. You can use glass or a metal bowl to create the zabaglione.
In your glass or metal bowl, mix together the egg yolks and cane sugar; then add Madeira wine and whisk together until fully blended and the mixture looks smooth.
Place your bowl over your pot and cook the egg mixture over low heat, stirring constantly for 8 minutes. Using a rubber spatula and moving the thickness of the mixture from the bottom and sides, you will notice that at the 5 minute mark it will instantly change texture, going from a thin liquid to a much thicker custard that is suddenly slightly smaller in quantity. At 7 minutes you can turn off the heat and stir for a few more strokes. Let this mixture cool to room temperature. Cover and refrigerate at least 4 hours or overnight, until thoroughly chilled.
day 3: “whipped” cream
1 cup light cream
1 tbsp cane juice sugar
You’ll notice I say “whipped.” The original recipe calls for actual whipping cream but here again, I decided to go with a lighter cream in light of the richness of the mascarpone. The light cream will not become a typical whipped cream when you beat it with a handheld or standing mixer. And because you’re using double the mascarpone, you really don’t need the volume that an aerated whipping cream would create.
Beat the light cream with the sugar until foamy and blended. At this point you can gently fold in the light cream into your mascarpone; the mixture should now be smooth and light.
day 3: assembling the tiramisu
flavored coffee for dipping
1 1/2 cups hot strong coffee or espresso
2 tbsp hazelnut liquor
1 1/2 tbsp cane juice sugar
Mascarpone-cream filling
30-45 lady fingers
finishing options
2-4 tablespoons cocoa powder
hazelnuts
chocolate shavings
Mix together the hot espresso with sugar and hazelnut liquor in a wide, shallow dish.
In a large bowl, beat the mascarpone cream filling with the chilled zabaglione, blending until just combined and set aside.
Line your 8″x8″ pan with saran wrap, getting the plastic squarely into the corners so your tiramisu can layer evenly. Saran lining makes it easier to take the tiramisu out and cut and serve individual servings. If you don’t care about serving them individually and you’ll set your dish out for your guests to scoop out for themselves, you don’t have to bother lining the pan.
Working quickly, dip the ladyfingers one at a time into your warm coffee. Nota bene— The key here is to dip them long enough to get them moistened but not so long as to get them soaked where they start disintegrating. If the coffee is hot or warm, this shouldn’t take long. Depending on the thickness of your ladyfingers, you should start getting a feel for how long you need to soak yours. Soak the bottom layer for 3-4 seconds so that the mascarpone sticks to the fingers, but still take care to avoid disintegrating them. Soak the in-between layers for 1-3 seconds so they can retain a spongy instead of soggy texture in your assembled tiramisu. (If you’ve tasted a soggy tiramisu, you’ll be familiar with the taste of mush and alcohol, which is what we’re trying to avoid here.)
Immediately start placing each ladyfinger side by side in a single row in your pan. You can also break a lady finger into pieces when necessary, to ensure the base of your dish is completely covered. Once your fingers are moistened, it will be easier to squeeze in 1 more than might fit if they were placed dry into the bottom layer.
Spoon one-third of the cream mixture on top of the ladyfingers, then use a rubber spatula or frosting knife to spread the filling evenly, all the way to the edges.
Repeat to create 2 more layers, ending with the mascarpone filling. In the 2nd and 3rd layers of ladyfingers, space them out further from one another. When you cut into a square piece, you’ll see lovely diagonal layers of mascarpone. That comes from spacing the fingers out, which also keeps the tiramisu from becoming ladyfinger heavy.
Cover the pan with plastic wrap and refrigerate the tiramisu overnight. If you assemble your tiramisu in the morning, it will be ready to serve the same evening (just let it come to room temperature for about 10 minutes before serving it so the flavors open up.) You can also freeze it to serve much later (weeks!), but cover it more thoroughly and defrost it in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes and then a further 10 minutes at room temperature before serving.
To serve individually, lift the plastic from two sides of the pan. Cut into 9 squares and using a mesh strainer sprinkle with cocoa powder. Finish with chocolate curls and hazelnuts.
*I loved the quality of Whole Food’s 365 regular pasteurized heavy cream. But, I also created a mascarpone using Butterworks heavy cream, found in my local Whole Foods, as well. The Butterworks cream was butter yellow right out of the container, which I suppose is attributable to its higher percentage of butterfat.
credits and recipe sources
The February 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Aparna of My Diverse Kitchen and Deeba of Passionate About Baking. They chose Tiramisu as the challenge for the month. Their challenge recipe is based on recipes from The Washington Post, Cordon Bleu and Home and Baking Obsession.
Mascarpone Cheese: Vera’s Recipe from Baking Obsession
Savoiardi/Ladyfinger Biscuits: recipe from Cordon Bleu At Home
Tiramisu: Carminantonio’s recipe from The Washington Post, July 11 2007
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