I’ve secretly always wanted to make trifle. It’s such a rich, creamy, heavenly, luxurious (…) dessert. The ultimate treat. But once lactose intolerance hit about 9 years ago I figured I was SOL.
Even when I figured out that coconut cream could be whipped into something that could pass for whipped cream, I wasn’t sold on eating cups and cups of fattening, flavourless fluff. What I wanted in the trifle was the custard. So I just made that by itself. And it was great. Thanks, Alice Medrich.
But there’s something incredible about laying fruit and cream and custard into a giant parfait dish/punch bowl, placing each strawberry slice vertically so it looks like a ring of hearts around the side. Hopefully the horizontal line is consistent so the hearts don’t slinky their way around…Not that I would ever do that, no…
but do you know what the trick is? blending the whipped cream with thick, sweetened yogurt. Brilliant! Flavour and a creamy texture with just a little more body than cream, without weighing it all down. I used coconut yogurt, which has a natural sweetness, to blend into the coconut whipped cream and it still didn’t taste overly coconut-y. Dream. Come. True.
I started with this recipe, but ended with this one:
Amie’s Reinvented British Trifle
serves 10-ish
Sponge Cake:
5 eggs
3 tbsp earth balance spread (or butter or coconut oil)
2 tsp almond or vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups gluten-free all-purpose baking flour (Robin Hood has a new product out, but I prefer Bobs Red Mill. Or make your own)
2/3 cup coconut sugar (or cane sugar)
1/2 teaspoon salt
Vanilla Custard:
6 tbsp sugar
8 tsp gluten-free flour blend (same as above)
8 tsp cornstarch
2 whole eggs
2 egg yolks
2 cups almond milk
1 1/2 tsp almond or vanilla extract
1/2 cup coconut cream (or 2 cans coconut milk, placed in the fridge for an hour, opened without shaking, and cream layer on top scraped off)
1 cup coconut yogurt (or other thick yogurt, preferably plain, almond, or vanilla, and sweetened with 3 tbsp coconut sugar to taste if purchased unsweetened)
1 tsp almond or vanilla extract
1/2 cup strawberry jelly, or for a simpler version, 1 1/2 cups strawberries blended for 3 minutes with 2 tbsp coconut sugar and 1/4 tsp lemon juice (adjust sugar and lemon to taste)
1 pint strawberries, hulled and sliced
Directions:
To prepare sponge cake, preheat oven to 350°F. Line a large rimmed cookie tray or baking sheet with parchment paper. Coat the paper and pan sides with earth balance or oil.
Have eggs at room temperature.
Melt butter in a small saucepan over medium-low heat, swirling occasionally, until the white flecks of milk solids in the bottom of the pan start to turn golden brown, 4 to 8 minutes (this was in the original recipe and it didn’t happen for me, but I just let it cook for about 10 minutes and then took it off the heat). Scrape into a medium bowl. Let cool to room temperature, then stir in 2 teaspoons almond extract. Set aside.
Meanwhile, measure 1 1/4 cups gluten-free flour into a medium bowl.
Crack eggs into large mixing bowl. Add 2/3 cup sugar and 1/2 teaspoon salt and beat with an electric mixer on medium-high speed until tripled in volume and very pale light yellow, 5 to 15 minutes (depending on the strength of your mixer). To test if it’s beaten well enough, lift the beater from the batter: as the batter falls off the beater into the bowl, it should mound for a moment on the surface. Mine didn’t mound…so after about 15 minutes I shrugged and moved on. My sponge just wasn’t as light and airy, but with all that custard and cream, nobody complained.
Fold the flour into the egg mixture until just incorporated. Gently fold about 1 cup of the batter into the reserved butter. Then gently fold the butter mixture into the bowl of batter with a whisk until just incorporated, being careful not to overmix. Spread the batter evenly in the prepared baking sheet.
Bake 8-12 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with a few moist crumbs attached. Cool in the pan on a large wire rack for 10 minutes. Gently remove cake from pan, flip upside onto a clean surface or cooling rack, and remove parchment.
To make the custard, all you do for this recipe is thicken milk and eggs on the stove. The only way to mess it up is to let the eggs scramble, so make sure you whisk while you pour the hot milk over the eggs.
Combine the sugar, flour, and cornstarch in a large bowl. Add all the eggs and yolks and beat them for 1-2 minutes. They should be thick and almost white.
Scald the milk in a medium saucepan (until the edges just start to bubble a little. It shouldn’t boil) and pour it slowly over the egg mixture in a thin stream like olive oil, whisking constantly until all the milk is added. I kept beating with the handheld mixer here because I didn’t have enough hands to whisk and pour at the same time. I foresaw the eggs tumbling to the floor that way (you can put a kitchen towel under the bowl to help keep it from moving around of its own accord). The liquid ended up a bit frothy, though, so you kind of need to beat the froth down into the liquid afterward, or you’ll have a hard time telling when the mixture has thickened in the next step.
Pour the mixture back into the saucepan and cook on medium heat, stirring constantly with a whisk, reaching all over the bottom and sides of pan, until the mixture thickens a lot. When you think it’s had enough, keep cooking and whisking an extra 30-45 seconds. Then scrape your custard into a clean bowl and whisk in the vanilla. Cool. Cover. Refrigerate.
To make the whipped cream layer, whisk or beat coconut cream until smooth. Whisk in yogurt and extract.
To assemble trifle, cut the sponge cake into 1-inch cubes. Spread about 1/3 of the custard in the bottom of a trifle dish (or any see-through dish). Top with about 1/3 of the cake cubes followed by 1/3 or the jam or strawberry purée, and a single layer of strawberry slices. Line the sides of the dish with vertically-placed slices of strawberries (the prettiest ones). Now pour in 1/3 of the cream and use a spatula to even out the top. Repeat the layering two more times (it’s fine to the scrape the custard a little into the cream to even it out. Top the custard with a couple of leftover strawberry slices. Toss on some blueberries or more strawberry slices to cover any gaps in the cream. Sprigs of mint would be pretty too, but completely unnecessary when there’s already this much deliciousness involved.
Take a picture.
Take a spoon.
Dive in.
Thanks for the recipe. I’ve got my lactose-intolerant daughter coming for Christmas along with the rest of the family and wondered how I could make a trifle. This looks great. Merry Christmas!
I hope it was a great Christmas and a great trifle, Sheena! Thanks for getting in touch!
This recipe didn’t work for me at all. I used So Delicious coconut milk & yogurt, Earth Balance spread but regular sugar and a store-brand, all-purpose flour. The sponge cake didn’t raise at all but perhaps the recipe is missing the listing of baking powder. The custard was way too thick so I ended up adding more milk, eggs and vanilla. I should’ve added only a little bit of the cornstarch & flour at a time until the mixture was thick. The flavor came out OK but I think the ratio might not have been correct after I tried to fix it. Finally, the whipped cream didn’t get thick at all. So Delicious also carries coconut whipped cream but not in any of my local, grocery stores.
Hi Angela,
I’m so sorry your trifle didn’t work out! Let’s figure this out!!!
My sponge shouldn’t need baking powder. The recipe I used for the sponge (http://www.eatingwell.com/recipes/gluten_free_cranberry_trifle.html) doesn’t call for it either. It’s really about getting your eggs to rise well by having them at room temperature and folding them into the batter. I still find sponges very finicky.
Did you use coconut milk for the custard? It’s much more like cream and will take far less time to evaporate out excess water and thicken into custard.
And what kind of coconut milk did you use for the coconut whipped cream? Some have more cream on top of the can than others. Did you put it in the fridge overnight? That can help keep the watery coconut out of the cream and help it thicken into whipped cream better.