Tiramisu mousse

I'm not going to lie....the past few weeks have been a little bit hectic.  I packed (about 85% of) my apartment, moved downtown, unpacked (not nearly enough), spent the weekend in the 'burbs to celebrate my dad's 65th birthday (!!), came back to the city today, and packed up more of my old apartment.  Then, I came back downtown with a few bags in tow, and started unpacking some more!

Would I change any of it?  No, not a chance!  Except maybe I would've packed up my whole apartment before I moved so that I didn't have to go back and keep packing.  Like I'll have to do tomorrow after my 8-4 shift at work, and probably two days later, too.  :-(

So when my dad's 65th birthday fell TWO days after my move, I knew it was going to be hard to make a birthday treat for him.  I was definitely upset that I wouldn't be able to make anything, but it was highly unrealistic to think that I could.  I mean there was a good chance that my kitchen-aid wouldn't be unpacked, and that would be a travesty (in the end, as I'm sure you've figured out, it was unpacked on the first or second day).

But then something happened.  I came across a recipe.  It sounded good and it had easy in the title.  I read more and I was sold!  Easy Tiramisu Mousse sounded delicious.  And I thought it was perfect to pipe into small plastic cups and serve at the hors d'ourves party that my mom had planned for my dad.  The extensive, over the top, insane -- but also delicious -- hors d'ourves party that my mom had planned (there will be more on that in another post later, I promise!).

I was so amazed at how delicious and easy this was.  And it tasted just like tiramisu!  I highly recommend this recipe....as well as using a bigger serving vessel than I did.  I saw some people reach for seconds ;-)

Easy Tiramisu Mousse
From Crazy for Crust

Ingredients:

1.5 tsp instant coffee (like Starbucks Via or any other variety of instant coffee)
1/4 cup hot water
1 cup heavy whipping cream, cold
1.5 cups powdered sugar
8 oz mascarpone cheese or cream cheese (low fat cream cheese is fine, too) -- I used mascarpone
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
1 oz semi-sweet baking chocolate

Directions:

Put instant coffee into hot water and stir.
Let cool for 5 minutes, or longer.

Beat whipping cream until stiff peaks form.
Chill until ready to use.

Mix powdered sugar and mascarpone cheese with a hand mixer until smooth.
Mix in vanilla and 1 Tbsp of the coffee mixture.
Continue adding coffee until you reach your desired taste.  The original recipe blogger said she used the whole coffee mixture; I ended up using 2 Tbsp and loving the flavor.  

Fold whipped cream into coffee-mascarpone mixture gently.
Place the mousse in a gallon sized ziploc bag that is fitted with a large round or 1M tip (I used a piping bag with a star tip, because sometimes I'm a little crazy!).

Pipe a small amount in the bottom of your serving dishes.
Top the layer with a dusting of cocoa powder.
Continue layering mousse and cocoa powder in each dish.
Once you get to the top layer, grate the semisweet baking chocolate over the top of each dish (I used a little bit of cocoa powder and then went to town with the chocolate shavings).

Chill, covered, in the fridge until ready to be served.