Making the (subjectively) perfect tiramisu.

This tiramisu serves about 10 people.

48 hours prior: Preparing the ladyfingers

We’ll use ladyfingers as the biscuit basis of our tiramisu. While you can buy pre-made ladyfingers and skip this step entirely, I’ve found that the texture of the tiramisu happens to be better when using home-made biscuits.

For ~30 ladyfingers:

Ingredients:

• 5 egg yolks
• 25cl egg whites
• 125g granulated (white) sugar
• 125g plain flour
• 90g icing sugar

1. Remove tray(s) from oven and place baking paper on it.
2. Pre-heat oven at 180°C.
3. Separate egg yolks from whites, adjust white quantity with more eggs if needed so that you have exactly 25cl. Put a pinch of salt in the whites and move them in the fridge for now.
4. Beat the yolks with the granulated sugar with a whisk, until the resulting mix is light yellow and bubbly.
5. Prepare a Meringue with the egg whites – Beat the whites until stiff, but add continously the icing sugar to the mix mid-beating.
6. Add 1/3 of the Meringue to the yolk/sugar mix and mix throroughly with a whisk so that the result is homogeneous.
7. Add the rest of the Meringue to the mix along with the flour, and combine with a rubber spatula. The result should still be foamy – do not stir too much, otherwise the result will be liquid.
8. Place the mix into a pastry bag with a medium/large nozzle and dispense mix on the baking paper in the oven tray, in the form of ladyfingers. If you do not have a pastry bag, you can also use two large spoons: use one to scoop some mix, and the other to help scrape the mix in the first spoon.
9. Put some extra icing sugar in a sieve and sprinkle it on top of the uncooked biscuits.
10. Put the tray in the oven and bake for about 15 minutes. The biscuits should be puffy and have a nice light brown color.
11. Leave the biscuits rest for a day.

24 hours prior: Making the tiramisu

Ingredients:

• ~30 ladyfingers
• 8 eggs
• 160g granulated (white) sugar
• 500g mascarpone
• 30cl strong coffee
• 3-4cl Strega liqueur

1. Brew coffee and add Strega. The stronger the coffee is, the better: either brew multiple expressos, or filter multiple times, or use strong soluble coffee. Adjust the quantity of liqueur to taste.
2. Soak each ladyfinger in coffee. The biscuit should be moist, but not drenched – remove excess coffee with paper towels.
3. Separate egg yolks from whites.
4. Beat the yolks with the granulated sugar with a whisk, until the resulting mix is light yellow and bubbly.
5. Gradually add the mascarpone to the mix. The result should be homogeneous.
6. Beat the egg whites until stiff.
7. Gradually add the egg whites to the mix and combine with a rubber spatula.
8. Cover the bottom of the pan with ladyfingers.
9. Add a layer of mix on top of the biscuits, using half of the mix.
10. Repeat steps 8 and 9 once more.
11. Cover the pan with cling film and let rest in fridge for 24 hours.

Serving the tiramisu

Ingredients:

• Raw cocoa powder

1. Take the tiramisu out of the fridge right before serving.
2. Sprinkle cocoa powder on top using a sieve.
3. Decorate and serve.