Easy Traditional Tiramisu

I just love Tiramisu. It’s honestly one of my favorite deserts. I love that it’s not overly sweet and decadent. I know a lot of you may be shocked, but I really don’t enjoy extremely sweet and dense deserts. It always makes me feel thirsty and kind of gross after eating something very sweet. Now, I’m not hating on sweet deserts. If that’s your thing, that’s your thing. It’s just not for me. However, this super easy, traditional Tiramisu recipe should be everyone’s thing.

I always thought Tiramisu is a difficult cake to make. It’s so light and fluffy and perfectly moist (did everyone else cringe at the word like I did writing it?). Well, I was wrong. This is fairly simple and easy to do. I think everyone can do it. Everyone should at least try to!

You know that great feeling of accomplishment you get when you do something important, or you finish all your chores for the day? This easy Tiramisu recipe gives me that feeling. I felt so accomplished when I put this cake together and put it in the fridge. I hope you find this recipe good and easy to follow.

Try These Other Desserts!

BLUEBERRY LEMON AND GINGER MUFFINS

GERMAN CHOCOLATE CAKE BROWNIES

Print Recipe

5 from 2 votes

Easy Traditional Tiramisu.

An easy and delicious traditional Tiramisu recipe that will be your new go to desert.

Prep Time10 minutes mins

Cook Time30 minutes mins

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American, Italian

Servings: 12

Cost: 15

Equipment

• Electric Hand Mixer or whisk
• 2 glass or metal bowls
• Spatula
• Pan to assemble the cake, 8”x 8”, 9” x 9”, round pan or even a trifle bowl

Ingredients

• 6 Egg yolks
• 1 Cup Sugar
• 16 oz Mascarpone cream (room temperature)
• 1 or 2 Packages Ladyfingers
• 3 Tbsp Instant Coffee or Espresso
• 1 Cup Water (cold or room temp)
• 2 Tsp Dark rum (optional)
• 1 ¼  Cup Whipping cream
• Unsweetened cocoa powder
• Dark chocolate (shavings)

Instructions

Preparing the Sabayon (the sweet deliciousness that is the Tiramisu cream)

• Fill a pot with some water, about 3 inches and set it to simmer. 
• While waiting for the water to boil, separate the eggs whites and egg yolks (don’t discard the egg whites, they are useful for another recipe!) putting the egg yolks into a bowl.
• Add 1 cup sugar into the egg yolk bowl and put over the simmering water. Start mixing fast with an electric mixer (or a whisk) until the mixture becomes thick and about doubled in size. Don’t stop mixing as this is cooking the eggs, otherwise you might end up with a scrambled egg instead of a cream. About 10 minutes. Once this is achieved, put it aside on a towel or a cutting board to cool for a about 5-8 minutes. 
• While the Sabayon is cooling, whip 1 ¼ cup of whipping cream using the electric mixer (or your strong and mighty hand) until it becomes thick and creamy, about 5-7 minutes.

  Do not overdo it. The cream can become butter if whipped for too long!
• Check on that egg yolk and sugar mixture, if it’s about room temp or cooler, add the 16 oz. of Mascarpone cream and mix it up with the spatula. You know it’s mixed when you don’t see any more white cream. 
• Gently fold in the whipped cream with the yolk and the Mascarpone mixture.

  This is your light and fluffy, delicious cream that will be your base for the Tiramisu.

  Once done mixing everything together, cover and put in the fridge.

Tiramisu Assembly

• If you are still with me, you are now ready to start assembling this beauty! Let’s be honest, this hasn’t been hard so far and guess what, it’s about to become even easier. 

  Set out the dish you will be using to assemble the cake.

  Set out the ladyfingers
• Mix the 3 table spoons of instant coffee with the 1 cup of water and 2 teaspoons of rum (optional) in a bowl. 
• Set up an assembly of Ladyfingers-coffee/rum-dish. Looks like a complicated Excel formula, but it’s not. Really, you don’t have to do the assembly, I just like to keep things in order. 
• Take the Ladyfinger cookie and dunk it in the coffee/rum mixture. Don’t soak it, just dunk on both sides and put in the dish of your choosing. This will be the bottom layer of your cake. Continue until the bottom of the dish is covered in Ladyfingers (is anyone else imagining a proper 18^th century lady when I say Ladyfinger? No? Just me?).
• Take your Sabayon and put about half the cream on top of the Ladyfingers. 
• Start your second layer of Tiramisu by doing the exact same thing as step 2. Ladyfinger, dunk, put on top of cream. Boom, you’re a professional.
• Cover the second layer with the rest of the cream and put the cake in the fridge for about 6 hours or overnight.
• When ready to serve, sift some unsweetened cocoa powder on the slices and voila! I also like sprinkling dark chocolate shavings on top of the cake.