Easy Black Forest Trifle

What happens when you cross a black forest gateau with a trifle? You get this insanely delicious Black Forest Trifle: rich chocolate cake, kirsch soaked cherries and a luxurious chocolate custard, topped off with whipped cream and fresh cherries. Better still it’s surprisingly easy to make and takes just 30 minutes hands on time!

Course Christmas, Dessert, Pudding

Cuisine British, Fusion, German

Prep Time 30

Total Time 30

Servings people

Calories 488kcal

Author Eb Gargano

Ingredients

For the trifle

500 g chocolate sponge cake (Homemade or shop-bought – See Note 1)
390 g cherries in kirsch (I recommend Opies Black Cherries & Kirsch - See Note 2)
50 ml brandy or kirsch (See Note 3)
500 ml chocolate custard (I recommend Ambrosia Chocolate Custard - See Note 4)
100 g dark chocolate minimum 70% cocoa
600 ml double cream (See Note 5)

For the decoration

100 g dark chocolate refrigerated (optional – See Note 6)
100 g fresh cherries (optional – See Note 6)

Metric - US Customary

Instructions

If using homemade chocolate sponge cake, first make the sponge cake and allow to fully cool. (Approx. 1h after you remove it from the tin.)
Cut the sponge cake into squares and line the base of a large glass bowl / trifle bowl (e.g. THIS ONE)
Pour the kirsch soaked cherries and all of the liquid on top of the sponge cake in an even layer. (See Note 2.)
Pour the brandy (or kirsch) evenly over the sponge cake / cherries layer, and set aside to soak in while you make the custard.
Place the 500ml chocolate custard and 100g dark chocolate in a saucepan over a low heat, stirring regularly, until the chocolate has just melted. Allow to cool for 5 minutes then pour the chocolate custard evenly over the sponge cake / cherries layer.
Place the trifle in the fridge for at least 3 hours – but ideally overnight. (See Note 7.)
Whip the double cream, using an electric hand whisk, to the ‘soft peaks’ stage. (See Note 8.) Gently spoon the cream over the custard layer in big dollops.
Make chocolate curls by scraping a sharp knife over the top of your fridge-cold dark chocolate. Use a sharp knife held at a 45-degree angle against the edge of the chocolate. Firmly and slowly pull the blade toward you along the surface of the chocolate to curls. (See THIS VIDEO for a demonstration of how to do that.)
Alternatively, you can grate the fridge-cold dark chocolate on the large holes of a box grater, if you prefer.
Decorate the trifle using chocolate curls and the fresh cherries. Refrigerate until needed.

Notes

For the best flavour, I recommend making homemade chocolate sponge cake – it will taste much better than shop-bought, and only requires 15 minutes hands on time. However, if you’d prefer not to, feel free to use shop bought chocolate sponge cake!
I strongly recommend using kirsch soaked cherries for the best flavour. But you can use fresh, tinned or frozen cherries if you prefer. If you use any of these alternatives, I recommend you increase the brandy / kirsch from 50ml to 75ml. You can soak your own cherries in the 75ml brandy/kirsch for a few hours (or even overnight) before making this recipe, if you have the time.
When you buy kirsch soaked cherries there is not enough liquid in the jar for a trifle, additionally the actual alcohol content tends to be pretty low! For these two reasons I recommend you add 50ml of either brandy or kirsch to the trifle. This will give you a much better flavour and texture.
I strongly recommend using 500g Ambrosia Chocolate Custard mixed with 100g 70% dark chocolate. Adding the dark chocolate will give you a richer more chocolatey custard (honestly, it tastes like something from a fancy patisserie!) but crucially it also helps the custard set – something tinned custard won’t do on its own. If you prefer a less chocolatey custard, use regular yellow custard with the dark chocolate instead.
You can also use whipping cream, if you prefer. Many recipes call for sugar and vanilla to be added to the cream before whisking. Personally, I prefer not to add sugar and vanilla because I think the slight touch of ‘savoury-ness’ of the plain double cream really balances out the other sweeter flavours in this trifle beautifully. In my opinion adding sugar and vanilla to the whipped cream makes this whole dessert too sweet and ‘cloying’ – but if your tastes are different and you want to add sugar and vanilla to the cream – don’t let me stop you! 1 teaspoon vanilla extract and 30g sugar should be about right (either icing sugar or caster sugar will work).
You can use any decorations you like here. Personally, I use fresh cherries and chocolate curls, but you can use flaked almonds, a crumbled up flake, grated dark chocolate, hundreds and thousands, glacé cherries, chopped almonds, other types of fresh fruit – whatever you like!
I strongly recommend making this trifle - up to the custard layer - the day before and leaving it overnight in the fridge – this is partly to allow the flavours to meld and mingle and partly to allow the custard to set properly – if you don’t allow the custard to set properly it won’t be able to support the cream layer, and the cream will ‘sink’.
For best results, take the cream layer to the ‘soft peak’ stage where you can easily spoon it over the custard layer – if you whip it too long, it will get too thick and be really hard to spread over the custard layer and it won’t look as attractive either.
This trifle takes 30 minutes to assemble. You will also need to allow time to make the cake (if making homemade cake) and at least 3 hours for the custard to set in the fridge.
Not suitable for freezing.
Nutrition information is approximate and meant as a guideline only.

Nutrition