Tokyo-based patissier Fabrizio Fiorani, who was named Asia¡¯s Best Pastry Chef at the Asia¡¯s 50 Best Restaurants awards ceremony in Macau on March 26, has always loved tiramisu, the Italian confection of coffee-soaked sponge cake layered with sweetened mascarpone cheese and cocoa powder. It was the first dessert he learned to make, at the age of 14, while working at a gelato shop in his native city of Rome, and it¡¯s still the treat he craves most at the end of a long day.
At Bulgari Il Ristorante Luca Fantin, where Fiorani has been the head pastry chef since 2015, some of his most delightful creations are humorous (tiramisu translates, roughly, as ¡°cheer me up¡°) riffs on the dish. Once, he presented it as a glazed cookie precisely cut into the shape of Italy ¡ª including the islands of Sardinia and Sicily ¡ª alongside a chocolate truffle filled with coffee ganache.
Another time, it came in the form of edible letters spelling out ¡°tiramisu.¡± More recently, he turned it into a pair of faux Groucho Marx glasses, perched atop a red plastic nose and served with mascarpone gelato. The ¡°glasses¡± were coffee-flavored biscuits dotted with mascarpone cream and covered with a delicate layer of chocolate; he found the plastic nose at a ?100 discount shop.
With your current subscription plan you can comment on stories. However, before writing your first comment, please create a display name in the Profile section of your subscriber account page.