To Tiramisu or not to Tiramisu?

Not to Tiramisu. Seriously.

Tomorrow is Teenie's birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TEENIE!! Based on her recent craving for Tiramisu, that she couldn't find ANYONE serving in town, I filed that information away, and decided to surprise her on her birthday with homemade TIRAMISU. My first inkling that there may be a bump in the road is when I found out that she was taking off work on her birthday. Harruummpphhhh. I doubted she'd want a 9x13 pan of the stuff for herself, so I thought I'd take it to her place of employment and she could share the wealth with her co-workers. So, I changed my plan and decided to really throw her off and take it to her THE DAY BEFORE her birthday......she'd REALLY be surprised!!

I went yesterday to purchase the ingredients for the Tiramisu. I bought bittersweet chocolate, eggs and went on the search for Lady Fingers. Hy-Vee didn't have them, so I went to Schnucks. They are the only place I know of that has Marscapone cheese, as well. Schnucks was OUT of Lady Fingers (but not Marscapone), and the sweet girl in the bakery called Gerbes....of COURSE they had Lady Fingers. I'd been there twice already yesterday, and didn't THINK to look...duhh....so back to Gerbes I went. Bought the lady fingers....OH YEAH....earlier in the day, I went to the coffee shop to get real espresso....since I couldn't find any instant espresso powder. We live in the boonies.......with all the chocolate recipes that have espresso in it you'd THINK you could find it.....but NOOOOOOOO.

Anyway, back to more coherent thinking......I FINALLY gathered my ingredients, came home and had some pizza, and decided to tackle the recipe. I was really leery of the raw egg yolks.....I'm really goofy about chicken and raw eggs. I read several recipes and saw that one recipe beat the egg yolks and sugar over a double boiler.....not PERFECT, but at least somewhat cooked. I got my water simmering, and my metal bowl with the yolks and sugar. I beat the HECK out of it to make it thick and creamy...and managed to spray my whole stove with egg yolk.......**sigh**. I got that done, and while I was waiting for them to cool a bit, I got out the Marscapone cheese, the rum and my handy dandy espresso. I didn't get a full cup as I thought, so Mr. Perfectly made some triple strong coffee to have on hand if I ran out of espresso. I beat the egg mixture, the cheese and the espresso (oh, and I added vanilla), and it looked sort of loose.....not at all THICK......more like a thick pancake batter. So, I stuck it in the fridge while I dealt with the lady fingers.

Oh, the Lady Fingers. If you'll read the recipe, it SAYS not to soak them for more than 5 seconds---or they'd absorb too much liquid. Ok, 5 seconds doesn't seem like a long time, but think of something awkward....oh.....let's say, like being NAKED in front of a woman spray tanning you......NOW how long is 5 seconds? Or farting in front of your boss.....NOW how long is 5 seconds? It's a long freaking time. I thought I'd be efficient and took a whole ROW of Lady Fingers and gently placed them in the espresso/rum concoction. Hoooeeeeeeee.......they were SOGGY immediately. IMMEDIATELY. Oh no, now what? I'm digging soggy lady fingers from the liquid, and thought I'd go to 2 at a time....well THEY soaked up the liquid like NOBODY'S BUSINESS. By the time all the lady fingers were soaked, I'd gone through at least 3x, and maybe 4x the amount of espresso/coffee/rum. Yeah. I made a baby lady finger sandwich for me and Son #2 to try, and can you say BITTER? UGH. I put it all together, with the extra soggy Lady Fingers and put it all in the fridge KNOWING that I couldn't serve this to her and her co-workers.........

So, here is the soggy Tiramisu story. I went in and tried it before blogging so I could have first hand knowledge of what it's like. Parts are NASTY and parts aren't so bad.......I went ahead and kept it thinking I'll pick through it later. I consider myself to be a decent cook.....but apparently my judgement in using over 3x the amount of coffee/rum wasn't such a fabulous idea.

So, now tomorrow's her birthday, and my big surprise ended up being a big bust.

Any ideas of what I could do NOW?