The ferry ride was fine on the way over, but the water was a bit choppy on the way back, but nobody near us actually got sick due to the bobbing of the boat. It was nice dropping off our luggage in Hyannis before parking the car in a lot further away. The daffodils had only just poked their leaves out of the earth in upstate NY but were already blooming on the island.
We enjoyed walking on the beach even though we had coats on. I miss the ocean, sea salt air, cawing seagulls and the sound of surf. We also walked around town, checking out TWO real bookstores (the closest one to where we live now is an hour away), a pharmacy with a counter offering ice cream among other things, a grocery store for ingredients (photo of trifle and recipe at the end of the post), and a couple of places to get a bagel and other pre-cooked foods.
Based on what we heard over dinner, we wouldn’t be able to afford a week on Nantucket at lodging prices during the summer, but it was a great spring weekend away.
Trifle:
Step one: Prepare cake or pound cake either from a box mix, from scratch, or use a store-bought pound cake. I made a lemon trifle from scratch during the great lemon escapade a few years ago, and the sky is the limit when it comes to flavors for trifle. This time, I used a box mix for chocolate cake and followed the package directions. You can substitute apple sauce for the oil, egg substitute, etc. Bake and let cool, then cut into small squares.
Step two: Make two boxes of pudding according to the package directions. You could make pudding from scratch… Allow pudding to set. I used chocolate pudding mix, and it’s your choice if you’d like to mix up flavors/colors, such as butterscotch, pistachio, etc.
Step three: Make whipped cream from scratch or buy a tub of frozen whipped product.
In as large of a glass dish/bowl you have, place a 2-inch layer of cake squares. No need to line them up, just toss them in. You don’t need to measure how deep the layer is- I prefer to have 2 layers of everything, so that’s why I keep them a bit smaller. If you have a deep trifle dish, you can make the layers as large or small as you wish.
Spoon in no more than half of the chocolate pudding. This dessert is fun to make because it doesn’t have to look perfect. It will look great and taste fabulous, so don’t worry about filling each hole between the squares of cake.
Spoon a layer of whipped cream over the chocolate pudding. Uneven is ok, and the layer doesn’t have to be the same depth all the way across. It is kind of (very) messy to distribute into individual serving dishes later, so nobody will see what the inside of the trifle layers look like.
Add another layer of cake, pudding, and whipped cream. Most containers will be full at this point. You can shave some chocolate on the top if you like. I would typically add fruit but didn’t this time. For kids, you could add cola-worms for a “dirt” dessert.
If you have enough tall glass dessert containers (for example, sundae dishes), you could make a bunch of individual trifles. However, most people like to see the giant trifle brought out, and don’t mind getting scoops of mixed-together dessert goodness in their own bowls.
Please note that this dessert is very sweet- especially the chocolate. I really like the lemon version and would like to try other flavors in the future, such as strawberry. I could also imagine making this with blueberry muffin mix made in a loaf pan, layering it with vanilla pudding.