Trifle

For the type of metal, see Pewter.

Trifle

Origin
Place of origin	England
Details
Course served	Dessert
Main ingredient(s)	Sponge cake, custard, fruit, whipped cream

Trifle is an English dessert dish made from thick (or often solidified) custard and diced fruit (whose name may precede the word 'trifle' when describing it, as in 'strawberry trifle'), interwoven with a thin layer of sponge fingers or more delicate sponge cake soaked in sherry or other fortified wine and/or fruit syrup, and almost always topped with whipped cream. The fruit and sponge layers are suspended in fruit-flavoured jelly (gelatin in American English). These ingredients are usually arranged to produce three or four layers.

History

Illustrations from Isabella Beeton's Book of Household Management, 1861

The earliest use of the name trifle was for a thick cream flavoured with sugar, ginger and rosewater, the recipe for which was published in England, 1587, in a book called "The good huswife's Jewell" by Thomas Dawson. Sixty years later eggs were added and the custard was poured over alcohol soaked bread.

Research indicates it evolved from a similar dessert known as a fool or foole, and originally the two names were used interchangeably.

While some people consider the inclusion of jelly to be a recent variation, the earliest known recipe to include jelly is from later editions of Hannah Glasse's The Art of Cookery. In her recipe she instructed using hartshorn or bones of calves feet as the base ingredient for the jelly. The poet Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote of trifles containing jelly in 1861.

Variations

Trifles may contain a small amount of alcohol such as port, or, most commonly, sweet sherry or madeira wine. Non-alcoholic versions use sweet juices or soft drinks such as ginger ale instead, as the liquid is necessary to moisten the cake and are simply known as fruit trifle without any mention of a spirit before the name of the trifle.

One popular trifle variant has the sponge soaked in jelly when the trifle is made, which sets when refrigerated. The cake and jelly bind together and produce a pleasant texture if made in the correct proportions.

The Scots have a similar dish to trifle, Tipsy Laird, made with Drambuie or whisky. In the Southern US, a variant of trifle is known as tipsy cake.

Layers of a trifle dessert.

A trifle is often used for decoration as well as taste, incorporating the bright, layered colours of the fruit, jelly, jam, and the contrast of the creamy yellow custard and white cream. Trifles are often served at Christmas time, sometimes as a lighter alternative to the much denser Christmas pudding.

Similar desserts

A Creole trifle (also sometimes known as a 'Russian cake' or a 'Russian Slab') is a different but related dessert item consisting of pieces of a variety of cakes mixed and packed firmly, moistened with alcohol (commonly red wine or rum) and a sweet syrup or fruit juice, and chilled. The resulting cake contains a variety of colour and flavour. Bakeries in New Orleans have been known to produce such cakes out of their left-over or imperfect baked goods. A similar dessert in Germany and Austria goes by the name of Punschtorte.

In Italy, a dessert similar to and probably based on trifle is known as zuppa inglese, meaning English Soup.

See also

• Cassata
• List of custard desserts

External links

• Traditional Trifle recipe by Delia Smith

• Time-lapse video of a trifle being constructed