Chocolate Tiramisu Cake

Still in the tiramisu mood, one of my friends asked me if I could make a chocolate tiramisu cake for her husband upcoming birthday. Hmm...interesing. I made chocolate tiramisu cake once, trying out a recipe about two years ago. But I've never actually made it based on the recipe that I've been using.

Since I have leftover cream that's almost expired, I thought this is the perfect opportunity to experiment :)
So, this cake consists of two layers of chocolate sponge cakes, soaked heavily with espresso-rum mixture so that it would have the same texture as soaked lady fingers. The filling is the same as the classic tiramisu, mascarpone cream filling. I just added melted bittersweet chocolate and more rum and coffee in the filling so that the flavor would be more pronounced, since chocolate is a strong flavor.

I wanted to decorate it as simple as possible, but still looks elegant, so I piped chantilly cream on the top to look like a daisy, then dust it with cocoa powder. The side is decorated with just melted chocolate that I shaped like the picture. I'm quite satisfied with the look though.

I asked my QA friends (who get to taste almost every cake I make and give me some feedback) to taste it (although it ends up that they're not only tasting it, but finishing the whole cake!!! and I only got to taste about one spoonful of the cake). The whole cake disappeared in about one night. What I found in the fridge the following day, was just an empty box sitting nicely in their fridge.
The cake was great. It tasted like a very good chocolate mousse cake. You can definitely taste the rum and there's a pretty strong espresso after taste. So, the three main flavors are definitely there, but I might reduce the amount of chocolate in the filling so that it doesn't overpower the other flavors. I can barely taste the mascarpone cheese, which is predictable considering that mascarpone cheese is so subtle and chocolate is so strong.

Honestly, I don't think that reducing the amount of chocolate would make the mascarpone tastes stronger. Whatever modification I make, this is the best flavor I can get. Tiramisu is not tiramisu anymore if you add chocolate to it. It will completely change the taste.

I like the flavor of the cake. I mean, what else could you ask for? chocolate, rum, and coffee are definitely a match made in heaven. So, considering that I'm not a big fan of chocolate and I like this cake, I think this deserves to go into my permanent recipe file.

Here's is the individual version of it