Tiramisu Torte

First off, let me say this:  I MADE A HUGE PARTY FAUX PAS.  I was invited to a Cinco de Mayo dinner (yes, I am THAT FAR BEHIND in reviews, I am writing on September 20^th about something I ate on May 5^th, don’t judge…).  Anyway, I was invited to a Cinco de Mayo dinner and asked to bring dessert.  Not only did I not bake or make anything, I didn’t even bring anything appropriate for the theme!!!  Yes, I was “that guest” that showed up at a dinner with a boxed dessert from TJ’s, an Italian Tiramisu to be precise.

But, but, butttt, to make matters even worse, it turns out that the party hosts (who I am related to and should know better) are not fans of tiramisu.

Fail fail fail on all fronts, Susan (I say to myself in the third person).  You win the SUCKY GUEST award.

Hey, at least I didn't just bring it over still in the BOX!  As you can see here when you peek
into our fridge, I put it on a very pretty plate (and you can also see that we have a 3/4 empty
bottle of margarita mix and some left over pizza in the fridge...  Charming.)

Ok, now that I have gotten that off my chest, let’s take a look at Trader Joe’s Tiramisu Torte, shall we??  (NOTE – until today when I finally wrote up this review, I thought we had been eating and reviewing Tiramisu, not Tiramisu Torte…  See note at the end of this article.)

It looks pretty on the box, no?

I shared this product with my in-laws, Greg, Joan, and Chris.  I served tiny slices since we had just indulged in lots of tacos for dinner.  Here is what people thought:

Chris:  Chris is a college student who had just returned home for the summer. He is not a fan of coffee (an important element of tiramisu….).  Here is what he thought, “It… Ummm…  It is not BAD….  I am not the biggest fan of coffee and coffee flavors, so naturally I am not THAT keen on it…  But the coffee flavor is not so overwhelming that I can’t continue eating it.  It’s good.  I give it a 1.75.”  (Editor’s note:  for someone who hates coffee, he sure did eat the whole piece of tiramisu.)

Me:  I didn’t choke on this tiramisu, and I have choked on others in the past.  You know that whole thing where you accidentally suck a big breath in just as your fork-load of tiramisu reaches your mouth, and you choke on the powder??  (Crickets…)  Umm, you don’t know that feeling?  Is it just ME then??  Well, this particular tiramisu did not have that weird affect, so that’s a plus.  I like the texture of this dessert – the bottom layer was not what I would call a “normal” tiramisu layer.  I also liked that the dessert had some little chunks in it – little chocolate bits, which tasted good.  The middle layer seemed almost ice cream-ish, almost like an ice cream cake.  It was obviously very easy to prepare.  I like it.  it would be nice to pair with an espresso if you are a coffee lover.  I do think it is sort of expensive when you compare it to other stuff at Trader Joe's.  I give this a 3.75.

As you can see, David thought it was going to be a good dessert.
Sadly, he didn't even get to eat any of it, since he was busy that night and couldn't come to the dinner.

Greg (father of the family also not a coffee fan, which I obviously forgot before I brought this dessert to the gathering):  “It is sweet.  The texture is good.  But it is coffee.  I give it a 2.”  (Editor’s note:  he DID finish his whole piece.)

Joan (mother of the family, liker of coffee):  “There was nothing exactly bad about this, but if you could only eat one dessert, I would choose many other desserts over this…  The best part were the fresh raspberries (editor:  I added those, they do not come in the box 😊 ).  The bottom is like chocolate cake, not the traditional tiramisu layer.  It did not appear to have been SOAKED in coffee.  It was somewhat dry-ish.  The coffee flavor reminded me more of Kahlua than coffee – so more like a coffee syrup.  In general I am not a big fan of tiramisu.  This was not tiramisu-ish, so I thought it would be better for me…  But I would prefer a cheesecake to this.  This looked more like cheesecake than tiramisu actually, though it had a nipple…  (Greg pointed out that the nipple was an indicator that it was mass produced.  The TJ's price tag says it is handmade, so...  Not sure.)  The cocoa powder was the highlight for me.  I would give this tiramisu a 1.”

The raspberries (also from Trader Joe's, of course) made the plates look pretty and were Joan's favorite part.

Ok then…  This tiramisu is made in ITALY.  Maybe this is more like a real ITALIAN version of the dessert?  It is hard to know what to give the product overall, since most of the taste testers were not fans of the ingredients, let alone the final product.  But I think the fact that I, someone who likes tiramisu, and Joan, someone who may not be the biggest tiramisu fan but a lover of coffee, both were not bowled away by this dessert says something.  I am not going to score this with a mathematical average of all reviewers because that seems harsh, but I am going to take all viewpoints into consideration before slapping on a final number.

Also, now that I look at the photos I took, I see this is not called TIRAMISU, it is called TIRAMISU TORTE…  So obviously, that explains why it didn’t seem like “regular” tiramisu and we were looking at it thru the wrong lens!!!

Does that fact negate our reviews??  Perhaps…  But I still think our opinions were pretty clear – this isn’t a “must eat” dessert, no matter what you call it.  whether you are counting calories or counting pennies, I would use your diet and your money in another manner…

Price tag

Price:  $6.99

Rating: 2.75