Bake Your Own Savoiardi: A Tiramisu and Gelato Class

Almost every tiramisu class in Rome starts with a packet of shop-bought savoiardi. This one starts with flour, eggs and sugar, and you bake the biscuits yourself before anything else happens. It is the step that decides whether the finished thing holds together or turns to soup, and it is the step everyone else skips. From there: the mascarpone cream, the assembly, and how to present it so it looks like the version in the window rather than a bowl of brown mush. You do the work. The pastry chef corrects it. The class is alcohol free throughout, which also means the tiramisu is made without liqueur. Before the tiramisu comes the gelato half. The difference between gelato and ice cream is real and mechanical, not marketing, and once it is explained you can see it in the tub. You then make a sorbet and eat it. Groups are small, semi-private, which on a hands-on class matters more than on a walk. One thing worth knowing while you are making it: tiramisu is not a Roman dessert. It comes from the north east of Italy and is younger than most people assume, which is why you will not find it in a book of traditional Roman cooking. Meeting point: Piazza San Cosimato, at the corner with Via Natale del Grande.