Chocolate With Francois Chocolate Tiramisu

This month, the group of chocolate lovers who bake from Francois Payard’s book “Chocolate Epiphany” made Tiramisu. It was chosen by Sandy of Seattle Pastry. Sandy is very talented and I’m sure did total justice to this recipe. As for me, my enthusiasm was lacking since I’m not a big fan of tiramisu. The recipe was long and I went at it half heartedly. I made it the weekend Ted was at the Masters and froze it, not sure of the outcome once defrosted. I took a chance and defrosted the Tiramisu for Easter Sunday and it was a HUGE hit. It had more “ooohs and ahhhs” than my Cassatas. Oh well. You never know.

The cake was good, a rich chocolate moistened with strong coffee which is brushed on as you assemble the dish.

The assembly described by Francois should be done in a large bowl, like a trifle bow.

I chose not to assemble the tiramisu in the bowl because I wouldn’t be able to store it conveniently. So I made a rectangular cake.

I baked the chocolate cake (you can use a box mix if you want following the directions on the box but baking as follows) on an 11 x 15 baking sheet lined with parchment . *Pour the cake batter on the baking sheet and bake for 12 minutes at 400 F. When the cake had cooled, it was cut into 3 rectangles.

Even though the recipe is lengthy: Make the chocolate ganache. Make the custard.

Make custard :

1/2 pint heavy cream
1 oz sugar
3 egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla
pinch salt
Bring cream and sugar to a boil. Temper the yolks and return to the pot. Stir constantly over medium – high heat. Chill until thickened or overnight.

AND…don’t forget to BAKE THE CAKE! – I was able to work through and complete the tiramisu on a Friday night, after work before dinner.

I put the cake together and let it chill in the fridge as my filling was oozing out from all angles.

A lot of OOOOOZZZZEEEE

It was time for the “baker” to taste the result.

It was good but not “OH MY GOSH! WOW! THIS IS FANTASTIC!” good like some of Francois’ recipes. The custard wasn’t creamy enough. The ganache wasn’t soft enough. The cake was moist and I enjoyed eating that on it’s own.

In the end, it wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be when first looking at the recipe. The dessert didn’t disappoint, especially since it was such a hit at Easter.