Tiramisu Cake {Chocolate and Coffee Dessert}

How we came up with this recipe

Picture the scene… It’s 1996, I’m 15, wearing black lipstick, listening to The Cure and writing cringingly bad poetry. I have a secret. A big secret.

The truth is, I love cooking. I mean, I love cooking. It’s way not cool to be a teenage goth that knows how to make a soufflé. 

I had Mary Berry’s Complete Cookbook and I was not afraid to use it. I adored Mary before The Bake Off made her cool. I poured over that book for hours. 

I dreamed of the creations in it, sophisticated duck á l’orange, fluorescent yellow mango cheesecake and fancy pants coronation chicken. (Surely they were a bit out of date even in the 1990s? I’m not that old, right?!)

One dish stood out even more than all the others. The dreamy, creamy, light tiramisu. It was the height of cosmopolitan cooking. European, with booze in too! 

I loved making it. Seeing the eggs transform into this silky, cloud-like dessert never failed to secretly cheer me from my teenage angst. I made it at every opportunity.

I still love and use that same recipe for tiramisu now, 18 years later. It was only a matter of time before the flavours made it into a cake, so I give you… Tiramisu Cake!

Tiramisu Cake Ingredients

• Butter – Use unsalted
• Soft light brown sugar
• Caster sugar
• Eggs – I use medium free range
• Self-raising flour
• Cocoa
• Instant coffee granules
• Boiling water

For the icing: 

• Unsalted butter
• Coffee-flavoured icing sugar – Or normal icing with instant coffee mixed in (see notes)
• Cream cheese – Use full fat
• Vanilla extract 

To decorate:

• Dark chocolate
• Chocolate coffee beans – I use these ones

How to make Tiramisu Cake

1. Grease your tins and preheat the oven.
2. Cream the butter and sugars together until pale and light.
3. Mix in the eggs one at a time, the the flour (by hand).
4. Put half of the mixture into one of your tins.
5. Mix the cocoa, coffee and water until dissolved.
6. Stir into the remaining cake mixture, then put this into another tin.
7. Smooth the batter in both, with a small dip in the middle.
8. Bake for about 30-35 minutes. 
9. Make your icing. 
10. When the cakes are cold, level them with a carving knife and trim the top crust off. Split each cake in half horizontally so you now have 4 layers. 
11. Sandwich each layer with your buttercream, and a layer on top.
12. Cover the sides with buttercream too, and roll in grated chocolate. 
13. Top the cake with more buttercream, pipe swirls and add chocolate and coffee beans.