Green Tea Tiramisu

(serves 8-10)

This was one of the dishes of the dinner party that required the most experimentation and prep, probably just because i was a little over-ambitious in trying to get the right texture and have it look as attractive as possible lol. Again, a fair bit of research went into this, which i'll keep brief but will go into a little for anyone who enjoys this kind of silliness. i found that there were 2 prominent 'styles' of green tea tiramisu around;

(i) A traditional-style tiramisu with sponge fingers soaked in green tea, served with green tea mascarpone 

(ii) A more innovative Asian style with green tea sponge cake and mascarpone layers in between.

So i tried both separately:

Both tasted good, but in an attempt to perfect it, i got some feedback from helpful taste-testers, and the conclusion was that appearance-wise, the white layers with green sponge cake looked better, but the sponge fingers fingers soaked up a lot more green tea flavour and had the right mushy mouth-feel... so of course, the only logical next step was to combine them! 

Prep time: 30 min
Cooking time: 20 min
Assembly time: 15 min


Ingredients:
Matcha Sponge Cake:
4 eggs, separated
1/2 C flour
1/2 C caster sugar
2 tsp matcha powder
40mL soy milk (or normal milk)


Mascarpone mix:
600mL cream
500g marscapone cheese
2 tsp matcha powder?
2 eggs, separated


Green tea syrup:
2 tsp green tea leaves
1 tsp green tea powder
2 C boiling water
1/4 C sugar
250g sponge fingers


Method:
Matcha sponge cake:
1. Preheat the oven to 180˚C.
2. Whisk the egg white and 1/4 C sugar until soft peaks form.
3. Beat the egg yolks, soy milk and 1/4 C sugar until pale yellow and well-combined. Sift in the flour and the matcha powder.
4. Fold in the egg whites.
5. Bake for 15-20 minutes until brown. Remove and cool.

Mascarpone mix:
6. Beat the 2 egg yolks and sugar together (potentially over medium heat over a pot). Cool and then whip in the mascarpone.
7. Whip the egg whites until soft peaks form.
8. Whip the cream until soft peaks form.
9. Fold the egg whites into the egg yolk mixture, then fold in the cream.
10. Separate 1/3 of it and add 1 tsp green tea powder to it and fold through.


To assemble:
11. Make the tea and add dissolve the sugar into it.
12. Cut the sponge cake in half, trim off the edges so it's nice and neat.
13. Layer the sponge cake first, drizzle (almost soak the cake) syrup on top, then put a layer of white marscapone mix on top.
14. Quickly soak both sides of the sponge fingers into the syrup, then place on top of the mascarpone.
15. Smooth over with a layer of green tea mascarpone.
16. Add the final layer of sponge cake, drizzle (drench if you like your tiramisu soft & mushy) on top with the syrup, then smooth over with the white mascarpone and refrigerate overnight.
17. Serve with a sprinkle of green tea powder on top.