Tiramisu

Author

Bass Jansson

Edited

Aug 21, 2026 8:00 AM

The Coffee

My mokapot takes 14g of fine coffee grounds and yields about 140g of coffee, we’ll add a big teaspoon of brown sugar (5g) to each batch, a tablespoon of Marsala (15g) and a pinch of salt. We’ll brew two batches. So in total:

• 280g coffee (28g fine grounds)
• 30g Marsala
• 10g brown sugar
• 0.3g of salt

This was enough coffee for 18 lady fingers, dipped two seconds into the cold coffee mixture. Maybe even enough for 24, we’ll check the limit next time. Lidl lady fingers come in packs of 12.

The Cream

Big test number one. We're going to make two different sugar syrup yolk mixtures and combine them with mascarpone in three different ratios. The final weight is the same, but we have six different results in the end. In this way we can compare sweetness, creaminess, texture and stability. Number one is the least sweet and number six is the sweetest, going from 10% to 20% sugar by weight.

M1 = 85g yolks + 65g sugar + 26g water

M2 = 65g yolks + 85g sugar + 34g water

1. 40g M1 + 135g mascarpone
2. 50g M1 + 125g mascarpone
3. 60g M1 + 115g mascarpone
4. 40g M2 + 135g mascarpone
5. 50g M2 + 125g mascarpone
6. 60g M2 + 115g mascarpone

Method:

• Make the coffee mixture, let it cool in the fridge and then dip the lady fingers in it for two seconds, sugar up, and then put them sugar down into the containers so the liquid can sink down through the dry part. Each container got three lady fingers and 175g of cream. Put the containers in the fridge while making the cream.
• Make the cream in two rounds, each round a different yolk sugar syrup mixture. Separate the yolks from the eggs and put them ready to be whipped. Heat up the sugar in a pan with the water, until completely dissolved, clear and bubbling. While whipping the yolks pour in the hot sugar syrup gently with a small stream. Keep whipping for 4 to 5 minutes until very pale with soft peaks. Scrape down any splashed syrup half way through to incorporate everything.
• Add the mascarpone to the whipped yolks and mix until smooth. Add the mixture on top of the lady fingers in each container. Do this for each ratio, and start over for the second yolk sugar syrup mixture.
• Let the tiramisu’s cool overnight and add a thin layer of cacao powder on top right before serving.

Results:

Ate a spoonful at 12 hours and did a proper test at 22 hours. Will eat more at about 36 hours and finish maybe at 48 hours.

1. Stable, glossy, nice color, wet, not cheesy, airy, a bit bland though, but nice mouth feel.
2. Too runny, not stable at 12 hours, but became slightly stable after 22 hours, slightly too sweet, glossy, yellow, slightly uneven color.
3. Way too runny and too sweet, airy, rich, weird aftertaste, but still tasty, like a custard, so not stable, dark yellow color and uneven color.
4. Tasty, not too sweet, very white and stiff, but in a nice way, like eating a cream cheese cake, air pockets, slightly crumbly, very matt looking, very stable
5. Stiff, quite white and little matt. Slightly tangy and a weird aftertaste. Slightly too sweet. After a second taste I do like it, its texture and balance are not too bad.
6. Too sweet and too airy. Good stability, slightly glossy.

The coffee and lady fingers were okay. Good taste, but maybe slightly too wet. There were some dry parts, but could be more. So, stronger coffee with less water and a shorter dipping time. Sugar inside was a good idea to balance it.

It looks like yolks improve taste, but decrease stability. Sugar just can either be too sweet or make it taste bland. More mascarpone seems to be better in general.

Ofcourse, too runny won't work, but we also learned that the time in the fridge helps with stability, even if still runny at 12 hours, it can get more stable at 24 hours.

Too much cream cheese feel is not desired, and too much air pockets or crumbliness is also not great. We want stable, but silky smooth. Creamy and thick, but still light. Air is important, but it shouldn't affect the texture in a bad way. Sweetness and depth should just be enough to not be boring, and sweetness shouldn't be overpowering.

From what I can see now, maybe 13% to 16% yolks, 10% to 13% sugar and 71% to 77% mascarpone. We could stretch these ranges a bit more maybe. What I am most curious about is at what ratios 15% yolks or even 16% yolks would be stable. Maybe 14% yolks, 11% sugar and 75% mascarpone. A recipe to try would be 50g yolks + 35g sugar + 14g water + 250g mascarpone + 6 lady fingers. Maybe more lady fingers.

While making the tiramisu ice cream, I discovered that the sweeter the cream, the better the cacao will taste, or in other words, it will fit in better. If it's not sweet enough, the cacao feels off, as if it should belong on there. When it's sweet, it balances perfectly with the cacao.

While doing another test, I discovered that there's definitely something like too much egg yolks. 15% egg yolks might be already too much, so let's stick to 14% now. Sugar needs to be sweet, so I’d say 15% to 17%. Mascarpone will end up being 69% to 71%, which is a nice range I think. So, next up is:

Sugar yolk mixture:

• 85g yolks
• 91g sugar
• 38g water

Creams:

1. 122g mascarpone + 8g sugar + 60g mixture
2. 126g mascarpone + 4g sugar + 60g mixture
3. 130g mascarpone + 0g sugar + 60g mixture

Funny, while putting these into their containers, it wasn't runny at all, so not enough egg yolks. I think the goal is to have a runny cream, without holding ribbons for long, that manages to stiffen up in the fridge to finally be able to hold its shape. That's the ultimate end point, where we have a stable cream and maximum flavour from the yolks. The sugar amount just needs to be enough to make the cacao taste good as if it belongs on there. So, 14% yolks is likely not enough, and 15% was already quite too runny. So maybe even 14.5% is the goal to reach here.

Been a while since the last test. Tried to make invert syrup yesterday and use that instead, but it turned out quite bad. Bitter it was. Maybe I burned the caramel. I would need to practice that first before wasting it on mascarpone. So we go classic again, with the quick syrup. This is our next test:

Sugar yolk mixture:

• 50g yolks (3 yolks)
• 57g sugar
• 23g water

Final mixtures:

• 125g mascarpone + 50g sugar-yolk
• 110g mascarpone + 50g sugar-yolk

Both with homemade mascarpone. First one came out slightly stiff, as in it could hold its shape and to make it flat on the top I needed to use the spoon. Second one came out nice and slightly runny, like holding its shape for just a couple of seconds before dissolving and let gravity do the work for an even flat top. Let's see how they stiffen up in the fridge.

Homemade mascarpone:

• 500g cream (35% fat)
• 2g citric acid in 10g of water

From Reddit:

• 500g of cream (35% fat)
• about 7.5g lemon juice or 1.5g of citric acid (if you are using citric acid dissolve it into a little bit of water first, like 10g)

Cream in a pot->reach 82-85°C slowly->let it cool to 60°C (you always need to stir)-> reach 82-85°C again->add lemon juice or citric acid->stir, it should thicken a little bit (if you used lemon juice if it does not thicken add a little bit more)->continue to stir reaching 55-60°C->cover for at least 3 hours. After three hours it should be as thick as yogurt, so it should now be filtered with a cloth, a bit like you would with yogurt to get something like greek yogurt, until the next day.

I didn't do the double heating. 1.5g citric acid seems a lot, it tastes sour. Maybe lemon juice is better. The yield was about 340g mascarpone. Texture not bad.

Lady finger test, without yolks:

• 120g egg whites (from 4 eggs)
• 84g sugar
• 60g flour
• 12g cornstarch
• 6g skim milk powder
• 2g lemon juice
• 0.5g salt

Baked it at 180 degrees, in mum's oven, but got brown very quickly, instead of the 10 to 15 minute goal. They were sweet and chewy. Then after cooling baked them again at 100 degrees for a while, until completely golden brown and very crisp. Not sure if this would work for in a tiramisu, as it is now.

Next up cream test, with store bought mascarpone.

• 67g yolks + 72g sugar + 29g water
• 250g mascarpone