I cheated...twice

I cheated a little bit this month.

Admittedly, cakes aren't my favorite thing to make. My thought is the box mixes are pretty darn good, so why go through the effort of making a whole cake from scratch? So I decided to make something that was cake-esque: tiramisu! It's one of my absolute favorite desserts, and I had never made it before.

I cheated one other time too...I bought ladyfingers (gasp!). All the recipes I found said in the ingredients "2 packages of ladyfingers," not "here's how to make ladyfingers from scratch." So I went with it.

Something I am quite proud of it, though, the comments on the recipe said it's best to wait 2 days before eating it, so the all the flavors come together. So we waited TWO WHOLE DAYS before diving into this heavently dessert. Seriously, that took a ton of self-control.

After 2 days of starting at it in my fridge, we tried it. Caleb approved, and so did Debi, my cubicle neighbor at work. So I consider it a win!

Anyway, happy belated birthday Omi! I hope you enjoyed your fruit tart "cake!" (which is also not really a cake, just saying)

Here's the recipe I used:

Ingredients

• 6 egg yolks

• 3/4 cup white sugar

• 2/3 cup milk

• 1 1/4 cup heavy cream

• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

• 1 pound mascarpone cheese

• 1/4 cup strong brewed coffee, room temperature (I doubled this)

• 2 tablespoons rum (I doubled this, but it was too much rum! Omi and Mary Berry probably would have approved though)

• 1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder

Directions

1. In a medium saucepan, whisk together egg yolks and sugar until well blended. Whisk in milk and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until mixture boils. Boil gently for 1 minute, remove from heat and allow to cool slightly. Cover tightly and chill in refrigerator 1 hour.

2. In a medium bowl, beat cream with vanilla until stiff peaks form. Whisk mascarpone into yolk mixture until smooth.

3. in a small bowl, combine coffee and rum. Dip ladyfingers in coffee mixture (but not too long or else they will fall apart)

4. Arrange half of soaked ladyfingers in the bottom of a 7x11 inch dish. Spread half of mascarpone mixture over ladyfingers, then half of whipped cream over that. Repeat layers and sprinkle with cocoa.

5. Cover and refrigerate. AND WAIT TWO WHOLE DAYS TO EAT IT. Seriously, it was torture.

Recipe from: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/21412/tiramisu-ii/