Tiramisu, where does one begin? This miraculous dessert only made a significant appearance in Italy in the 1970s of disputed origins and long before Americans discovered it. Bob made his first one in 1980 Munich with instructions from his then Italian girlfriend and continued sporadic production once returned to the homeland. A key input was the Mother Wonderful Cheesecake Cookbook bob acquired that decade, on which he based most of his subsequent variations, and even ran into the author by chance at a book signing cheesecake tasting demo at a local legendary bookstore at what is now the biggest mall in America: King of Prussia. Thanks Myra! Four decades have since elapsed without ever having looked back. Until now for this review.
Back in the states we had to deal with less than reliable eggs, so an adjustment had to be made to the classic recipe which used uncooked egg yolks and egg whites. Zabaione solved the yolk problem, but the beaten egg whites had to be replaced by whipped cream. Bad egg tiramisu was the result. Pumpkin tiramisu was a slight departure from the basic procedure, with the added pumpkin puree, and strawberry even more, starting from scratch using a Food Network recipe. Limoncello returned to the traditional approach, swapping out the liqueur for limoncello plus a few tweeks, which we then extended to guavaberry lingonberry, also based on our cheesecake experience with these flavors. Pistacchio too, following our cheesecake success with this flavor. Then we gave the strawberry variation a chance using our usual approach.
In the meantime Italians also opened up to new flavors, or at least its tourists have. Several multistore businesses opened in Rome offering single serving sizes of an array of interesting flavors. For chocolate allergy plagued dessert lovers, there are many options other than the classic tiramisu. Limoncello and pistacchio are our favorite alternatives.