Tiramisu with Prunes and Lime Curd

So I spend a lot of time reading other people's food blogs (but definitely never at work, Annie!), and a real shame is that I've set myself such strict parameters as to where I get the recipes for my own blog from, that I don't necessarily give myself the opportunity to try all the yummy looking things others have come up with. So when I saw this book, "There's a Mouse in the Soup... Recipes and Stories from Culinary Blogs" I wanted it BAD.

Reader, I fell off the wagon. The goddamn airplane has crashed into the mountain and I ended up buying 5 books in total. Luckily for me (Oh my God, Schadenfreude, I going to hell), the bookshop was going out of business, so they were practically giving everything away.

I got my Karmic ass kick later in the afternoon. Remember all the trouble I had finding Orange Blossom Water for my last dessert? Well when I went shopping for ingredients I discovered that the gigantic Sainsbury's near the boyfriend's house runneth over with the stuff, in much larger bottles for an eighth of the price I paid. Humbug.

Anyway, this recipe is from a French blog: http://lacuillerenbois.canalblog.com. It's still up, but obviously all in French.

I don't know why I chose this dish. I don't like prunes, I don't know anyone who likes prunes, and I don't want to know anyone who likes prunes! The boyfriend and his mum claim to enjoy them but they're both lying.

I didn't have enough limes, so used a couple of tangerines as well. Also, in view of the incredible amount of sugar in this recipe I substituted the sugar cane syrup for honey so that, you know, once all my teeth fall out from eating the first three layers, the honey soaked into the pancakes at the bottom will soothe and alleviate my bloody gums. God, what an imagination I have, I always prepare myself mentally for the worst case scenario. For example, the top layer has two raw eggs in it, will we all get salmonella? What if we don't eat it fast enough, how long will it keep in the fridge? Like if I go out for dinner with some girls from work tomorrow or something, and then get home really late, and I'm not really hungry anymore, and then the next day someone comes over and I tell them to help themselves to whatever in the fridge and they accidentally eat some and get REALLY SICK! Do I want to be responsible for something like that?

I wanted to make half the amount, in case it's really disgusting, but ended up doing the quantity given in the recipe due to the boyfriend's twisted, perverted supplications.
Result: This 'tiramisu' is missing the two things I most enjoy, coffee and alcohol, so I assumed it would turn out like some bastardized trifle. How wrong I was. You can really taste the tea that the prunes are soaked and cooked in, and the horrible strong taste that I dislike so much in the prunes themselves melts into something that almost resembles damson gin. Me and the boyfriend were standing over the pan, waiting for it to cool, and sneaking spoonfuls of the mixture like a couple of dorks. So, you know, I've been cured of my prune antithesis. The recipe suggests adding sugar to the prunes to taste, but it wasn't necessary.
The problem came when everything is put together, it's too fricking sweet. The top layer is the worst, all you can taste is raw egg and sugar. You know Mascapone on it's own would have been fine, it's almost as though the original recipe has been changed for the sake of change.
So that's it, my foray into the world of desserts is over. I'm still convinced that I'm not missing much. Next time - meat!