Trifle is one of my very favorite desserts. I love that it is so versatile and so, so delicious! You can pretty much put whatever you want into a trifle. Of course there are traditional English trifles, but you can stray from that very easily!
I chose to do a pretty standard trifle. I started with some pound cake that I cubed and soaked in simple syrup. I could eat just that alone!!! So delicious! I also made my standard pastry cream which is such a great recipe to master since it can be used in such a large variety of desserts. I really like trifle with raspberries, but it was a little early in the season to find tasty, reasonably priced raspberries, so I went with strawberries and macerated them for a bit in a small amount of sugar. I did put a little spin on my whipped cream. Instead of stirring in powdered sugar to sweeten the cream, I used brown sugar. The molasses in the brown sugar gave a nice flavor to the dessert as a whole.
What is so nice about trifle is that you could use angel food cake instead of pound cake, vanilla pudding instead of pastry cream, or any kind of fruit that you like or that is in season. I particularly like trifle with stone fruits when they are in season! If you aren't much of a baker, you could still throw together a trifle pretty easily. You can buy pre-made angel food cakes at any bakery. You can make a box of vanilla pudding. Choose whatever kind of fruit you like and make or buy some whipped cream. You just layer everything together, and voila, you have a trifle! It's that simple. Use whatever you have on hand or whatever is in season. Just make it your own!
