Well isn't this a royal coincidence! This week the lil' royal babe entered the world and I just happened to trifle... a perfect English-inspired dessert made for the celebration! I'm telling you, that's some magic. But I actually made this to promote the UK release of my new cookbook Vegan Comfort Classics: 101 Recipes to Feed Your Face on Ebury Books. Get your copy now... it has measurement conversions and everything!
This recipe for a vegan trifle with custard is a variation on the tiramisu trifle you'll find in the cookbook. You'll need to pick up a copy to make the vanilla cake recipe (on page 177) for this. Maybe you can find vegan-friendly ladyfingers, which are traditionally used in an English trifle, but I cannot. You can even make a boxed cake mix to cut some corners. But this vegan custard, though... it's creamy and delicious. It's obviously the best part about this whole layered treat!
what you need
For the vegan vanilla custard
- soft or medium firm tofu
- full-fat coconut milk
- nutritional yeast
- cornstarch
- sea salt
- ice cubes
For the vegan trifle
- vegan vanilla cake (already made and cooled)
- raspberry jam
- strawberries
- raspberries
- blackberries
- granulated sugar
- lemon juice & zest
- vegan whipped cream
how to make vegan trifle
Make the vanilla cakes in advance and allow them to cool completely.
Combine all the custard ingredients in a high-powered blender until very smooth.
Heat custard until thickened for about 6 minutes, whisking constantly.
Place the saucepan of custard over a bowl of ice water and whisk until it cools.
Combine mixed berries with sugar, lemon juice, and lemon zest. Set aside to macerate.
Cut rounds out of the vanilla cake and sliced each round of cake in half.
Spread raspberry jam onto half the cake rounds and then layer with the other halves.
Assemble the layers of the trifle in each glass jar with cake, custard, and berries. Top with coconut whipped cream and a few berries as garnish.
storage
Trifle is nice when it's been sitting a little while in the serving dishes all layered so that the cake soaks up the moisture a little bit. You can leave the whipped cream and berry garnish until just before serving and have the assembled trifles in the fridge for a few hours in advance.
You can also make the cake, custard, and berries a day or two in advance, keep them refrigerated, and then assemble the trifle a few hours before serving.
equipment
For the individual vegan trifles, pictured in this post, you'll want something like this for presentation or you can use small mason jars. You want a container that is about 10 oz to 13 oz in volume. If you want to make one large trifle, here's a trifle dish on my Amazon shop. Here are some other key pieces of equipment you'll need to make vegan trifle with custard.
- nut milk bag
- high-powered blender
- saucepan
- whisk
- heatproof spatula
- mixing bowls
- measuring cups and spoons
- microplane
- sharp knife
vegan trifle with custard
Ingredients
vegan custard
- 1 C soft or medium firm tofu (strained of excess water)
- ⅓ C granulated sugar
- ¾ C full fat coconut milk
- 2 tablespoon nutritional yeast
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- 3 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ⅛ teaspoon sea salt
berries & layers
- 3 C mixed raspberries & blackberries (2 x 6 oz/170 g pints of each berry)
- 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
- 2 teaspoon lemon juice
- 1 teaspoon lemon zest
- 2 x 7-inch or 8-inch vanilla cakes (from Vegan Comfort Classics)
- ½ C raspberry jam
- 2 C strawberries, sliced
- 1 ½ cups So Delicious Coco Whip (thawed in the fridge from frozen)
Instructions
- For making individual servings, use something that has straight sides and is 13 oz in volume and ideally 2 ¾-inches in diameter. You can also make 1 large regular trifle in a traditional trifle dish that is 7 to 8 inches in diameter. The cake should be made in advance.
- To strain the excess water from the tofu, I find it best to use a nut milk bag. Then combine all the ingredients for the custard in a blender and combine until very smooth.
- Pour the mixture into a saucepan and heat over medium while whisking constantly as it starts to thicken and bubble. It will be about 6 minutes to get it to the right thickness and looking kind of gelatinous.
- Remove the saucepan from the heat and into an ice bath. This is just a larger bowl with cold water and ice cubes. Place the bottom of the saucepan into the cold ice water and whisk the custard as it cools in the saucepan. This will prevent it from clumping. Set this aside until you assemble the trifles.
- Combine the mixed raspberries and blackberries in a mixing bowl with sugar, lemon juice, and zest and toss to coat well. Set this aside for 15 minutes to soften and macerate. If you have extra strawberries you can mix some in here as well.
- My trifle dishes were about 2 ¾-inches in diameter, so I cut rounds from the cake using a 2 ½-inch cookie cutter, otherwise cut rounds to whatever diameter you need to fit into the dishes that you have.
- Cut out 4 rounds from each cake layer. Slice each round in half lengthwise and spread a spoonful of jam on the inside of one round and top with another round creating a small layered cake.
- Place a cake round in the base of your dishes. Then the 2 cups of sliced strawberries will be placed around the diameter of the cake. Add a generous layer of custard, pushing it out to the sides slightly.
- Then top with a handful of mixed berries that have now become quite juicy.
- Top with another cake round with jam layered between. Repeat the same thing with the slices of strawberries around the sides. Then add more custard and top with whipped cream and a few berries on top as garnish. These can be made a couple of hours in advance and then refrigerated or eaten immediately!
Yvette
I made this, but a bit differently. But I did make the custard cream exactly your recipe. But I’m afraid there was a strange after taste. Could that be because of the kind of tofu I used? The consistency was amazing, but I couldn't get past that after taste. I feel like it was mix between the nutritional yeast and bean taste from the tofu. Is there a preferred tofu brand you use? I am in the NY though. But the texture was so amazing and very close the custard (not vegan) my mother makes for her cakes! Best
Courtney
Awesome. Just fantastic custard. Raspberries are my favorite, but due to being frozen inside in Texas randomly I made due with strawberries, blueberries with strawberry jam. Can't wait to try it as written! Will be in my desert rotation always.