The Pretty Tiramisu

I dropped by a quaint restaurant a couple of days ago. Charleston Restaurant, Pizza and Grill is a popular place for locals to sit and enjoy an easy-going lunch or have a coffee. [Note: here, the typical "tea-time", as I know it, is called "Kaffee trinken" which means "drink coffee". Hence, coffee drinking time happens between 3 and 4pm. Yes, it's important to get these eating details straight]

I like the vibes here. For one thing, it's a corner outlet, which means the al-fresco area opens into an alley.  

And before you think alleys are distasteful places for meals, alleys in Erfurt are quaint, cobbled pathways, paved with uneven cobblestones that have lasted hundreds of years. I swear, if you listened closely enough, you can still hear the clip-clopping of horses' hooves from carriages drawn long, long ago. The stories these alleys could tell. 

But I digress. 

I didn't have coffee that day. But I did have my tiramisu 😎 My chocolate vanilla tiramisu ball slathered with chocolate sauce and accompanied by the spring fruits of strawberry, kiwi and slices of mandarin (my side of the world would call them oranges). Peppered with sweet powder. 

I now know how the saying "it looks good enough to eat" was coined. This looked so good, I couldn't wait to eat it. 

The perfect dessert. It's pretty. Oh, so pretty. 

The tiramisu is double-layered, what you see is the chocolate and the vanilla is on the bottom layer. And they're both sitting on a slice of mandarin. Seriously, it could not be cuter. 

Oh, and the taste. Rich without actually being sickening. The chocolate tasted of chocolate, not sugar (this is very important for me because I believe chocolate has its own taste, without the help from all that commercial sugar). The vanilla had its own rich flavour, and no, it did not pale in comparison to its chocolate counterpart. This part I found intriguing, because all too often, when vanilla and a stronger flavour are combined, the poor vanilla is overshadowed. Not so here. Here, vanilla is just as capable to stand on its own, with its very own identity. I almost cried with pride.  

Tiramisu texture was amazing. Firm enough for me to spoon it out without it sloshing all over, yet soft enough for me not to have to hold the plate trying to scoop it out.  In fact, this was engrossing enough for me to spend at least 3 minutes just poking the top to test its dexterity, and coming away fascinated. 

The portion of the tiramisu ball combo was just nice for me. Generous enough for me to be able to swirl every spoonful as often as I wanted, while satisfying that hunger for dessert we all have once in a while. Modest enough for me to finish it completely, without feeling like I overdid it. The richness of flavour helped immensely - because it was so full of taste, it satisfied my craving enough without wanting a larger portion.  

I have gone to many dessert places where owners or servers think a drop is enough. Change that mindset. Eateries don't lose money serving bigger portions of dessert. They lose money when patrons don't come back for a second helping because the first one was way too little for what they paid for. In this case, I was happy to pay about 7 € for this tiramisu.  

I am not huge on sweet desserts, but I do have sweet pangs once in a while. So trust me when I say this dessert is worth the while. 

Hopefully, you'll come away as satisfied as I did. 

[P/s all photos on this blog (except the one on the template) are my personal pics, taken by me and not from any marketing/commercial collateral]