The restaurant that invented tiramisu is closing forever

Inured to the European financial crisis? Well here's a casualty that may jolt you into feeling something in your gut:

The Italian restaurant, La Beccherie, that is credited with inventing tiramisu — that oh-so-tasty coffee-soaked, chocolate-dusted dessert — has announced that it will close its doors at the end of the month. 

That's right, folks, one of the many horrible truths about a limping economy is that when you're down and out, needing dessert the most, that's when you are least likely to be able to afford it.

“There has been a fall in the number of customers,” owner Carlo Campeol told the Italian news site, Corriere della Serra, according to Quartz. “We’ve lost politicians, businesspeople, and members of the general public.”

La Beccherie, which opened in 1939 in Treviso, first started making tiramisu in the late 1970s. Word on the street is that Campeol’s relative, Ada, first made the dessert when she was looking for a pick-me-up after giving birth (tiramisu literally means "pick me up").

“It’s very sad, because this place was established by my grandfather,” Campeol told the Christian Science Monitor.

In closing, Le Beccherie joins 60,000 other bars and restaurants that have had to close in the midst of the euro crisis.

Forget Berlusconi, let's bring back tiramisu.