Recipe: Vegan Tiramisu

Andrea is a secondary school teacher in London. She teaches computing and has been vegan for over 25 years.
She enjoys cooking and loves cookery books. One of Andrea's strengths lies in her creativeness. She experiments and enjoys trying new ways of making things! 
Andrea has been working on making a great vegan tiramisu, and now that she's done it, she has been kind enough to share then recipe with us. 

Ingredients for the vegan mascarpone cheese 

• 200g of cashew nuts
• 100ml of a light vegetable oil e.g. sunflower oil
• 100ml of Almond milk (or any other non-dairy milk) - I prefer unsweetened, so you can control the sweetness of the dessert
• 2 teaspoons of vanilla essence
• 2 tablespoons of agave syrup or other liquid sweetener

Ingredients for the chocolate cream

• 100g of a 70% or above plain chocolate bar
• 400g silken tofu
• 2 heaped teaspoons of cocoa powder - honestly it makes it that much more chocolate
• 1 tablespoon of agave or other liquid sweetener

Ingredients for the base of the vegan non-alcoholic tiramisu 

• 1 packet vegan biscuits - I like using Against The Grain chocolate chip hazelnut cookies, but rich tea is fine or you could experiment with something like ginger nuts
• A mug of strong black coffee - instant or fresh is fine 

Ingredients for the dusting

• Cocoa powder

How to make vegan non-alcoholic tiramisu 

1. Soak the cashew nuts in boiling water, put them in a heatproof bowl and leave aside - if possible, soak two days prior, or overnight, because a longer soaking time will ensure a creamier dessert - If you want to use them the same day they will soften up after several hours of soaking, but if you do not own a modern whizzy food processor; overnight soaking, will give your food processor more of a fighting chance of getting the cream smooth.
2. Break the bar of chocolate into pieces and place in a heatproof bowl
3. Put the heatproof bowl in a pan filled with water, which is on a low heat - to melt the chocolate
4. Make the black coffee, put it in a bowl and leave it to cool
5. Put silken tofu in the food processor and add the sifted cocoa powder and sweetener and blend it until it's smooth
6. Pour in the melted chocolate and blend it until it's combined
7. Spoon the mixture into a glass dish and smooth down - gently shaking the bowl back and forth is usually enough to make it settle
8. Put it in the fridge to firm up and wash the processor bowl out
9. Drain the water away from the cashew nuts 
10. Add the almond milk to the soaked cashew nuts and blend it
11. Then drizzle the oil in, a little at a time, and the nut mixture will start to stick together
12. Keep adding the oil, blending it again, add some more oil, blend again and repeat 
13. Add the vanilla essence and agave and blend it again 
14. If the mixture looks bitty blend it some more
15. This can take some time, so you may need to let your food processor motor cool down
16. When the coffee has cooled and the chocolate cream has set, dip each biscuit into the coffee and hold it under until the coffee has soaked in well and it looks moist
17. Create a layer of biscuits over the chocolate cream mixture - you may need to break the biscuits up to fill the holes
18. Use any coffee left over by slowly spooning it over the biscuits until they cannot absorb any more liquid - Do not worry if the biscuits fall apart they need to be thoroughly soaked 
19. Pour/ladle the cashew nut cream over the biscuits and smooth down
20. Dust with cocoa powder - I use a tea strainer to do this
21. Put it in the fridge and leave it overnight to let the flavours mingle, but if you can't wait that long, leave it for a few hours, because the cashew nut cream needs to firm up

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