Daring Bakers Challenge - Tiramisu

The February 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Aparna of My Diverse Kitchen and Deeba of Passionate About Baking. They chose Tiramisu as the challenge for the month. Their challenge recipe is based on recipes from The Washington Post, Cordon Bleu at Home and Baking Obsession.

I have never eaten tiramisu. It must be because I’m not a fan of cheese, and tiramisu is all about the cream cheese. It’s also not the least bit healthy nor vegan friendly, and if you avoid soy as I do, it’s even more unfriendly. Nonetheless, I love these challenges and every month they are indeed a challenge!

Another major component of tiramisu is the ladyfinger cookies. Even though I didn’t use the vegan friendly recipe provided in my version of tiramisu, I did make these cookies. I used applesauce instead of margarine to keep them low fat, and although they were not the melt-in-your-mouth ladyfingers of my memory, they did make a tasty cookie.

My healthy tiramisu was quick and easy – half a banana cut in half, layered with almond cream, and topped with cacao nibs.

This is a delicious dessert I can enjoy and never feel guilty eating!

Here’s the recipe for ladyfingers if you’d like to try a vegan or dairyfree version.

EGGLESS LADYFINGERS

(Source: Adapted from Recipezaar.

This recipe makes about 4 long biscuits (3" long and 3/4" wide).

(I made a half batch and got 3 cookies.)

Ingredients:

4 tablespoons/ 55gms sugar

1 teaspoon/ 5ml vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups/ 340gms unsalted butter (I used unsweetened applesauce)

2 cups/ 250gms all purpose flour

1/2 cup/ 40gms coarsely ground almonds

powdered sugar

Method:
Blend all the ingredients well and adding the coarsely ground nuts last. Scrape the batter into a piping bag with a ¾-inch plain tip and pipe into fingers about 3 inches long at 1-inch intervals onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake them in a 300 degree F (150 C) oven for 30 to 45 minutes till they start turning slightly brown at the edges.

Take them out of the oven and cool on tray for about 5 minutes and then move the biscuits to a cooling rack. When slightly cool, roll them in powdered sugar. Store in an airtight container till required.