RASPBERRY TRIFLE
Although wild raspberries are the essence of all that is delicious, and both red and black ones grow widely across Southern Appalachia, you can substitute domestic ones.
Cover the bottom of a large bowl (or trifle dish) with a layer of crumbled pound cake. Place a layer of raspberries over the cake, followed by a layer of vanilla or tapioca pudding and a layer of whipped cream. Repeat layers until bowl is full, ending with whipped topping dotted by fresh berries.
NOTE: This is a versatile recipe which also works well with other berries. If you particularly enjoy chocolate, substitute chocolate cake, chocolate pudding, and crushed toffee pieces.
JC
—Celebrating Southern Appalachia Food written by Jim Casada and Tipper pressley
As you can see from the photo, blueberries work well in the recipe too. I made the trifle for Father’s Day. I wanted to pick some wild black raspberries I found growing down the hill to go in it, but right when I was about to start cooking a storm came up.
I was so thankful for the rain that I wasn’t upset about having to use the blueberries instead. That’s the last rain we’ve had in Brasstown. *Edited this morning to say we got rain overnight and I’m so thankful for it.
Most grocery stores sell pound cakes but I made my own by using Aunt Faye’s recipe. You can find it here. There’s a ton of vanilla pudding recipes, but I used this one. A box mix will also work great.
You can pick up a copy of our cookbook here.
Last night’s video: Matt Bought His Old Truck, Tending the Corn, & Miss Cindy’s Been Gone a Year.
Tipper
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I love making trifles. It’s usually strawberries with pound cake or I just throw this and that of berries in there.
Enjoyed watching you make it.
Hi Tipper, So glad to hear about the rain. We had a wee sprinkling today. Still pert’ near, extremely, hot here in southern Mississippi. We’re expecting three digit temps next week. Our back deck thermometer read 104 this morning. LOL. I have a friend I take a dessert to once in a while. I did a raspberry/blueberry/whipped cream and lemon curd trifle. Oh my goodness, they absolutely loved it. I hadn’t known she loved raspberries and her husband loved lemon. The blueberries were just a plus. I’ve done that a couple more times with no complaints ever. Just a little ditty about my trifles. Oh yes, it had a store bought pound cake. Loving on new baby yet? Hope so. Love and blessings to y’all. Today, tomorrow and always. J.
I watched the video of you making the trifle—just wonderful! However, I hated to see you had to crumble that lovely cake to make it. My sweet father-in-law made a great pound cake also. So sorry about Miss Cindy’s death, it was such a setback for you all but it seems you all make the best of what comes your way and I suspect that would make her happy!
My mom passed on June 16, 2020 and I am grateful for the good memories.
You spoke of sneezing this week and I grew up saying scat rat, and still say it to this day! The tail in the gravy line is so funny!! I enjoyed your carrot salad video recently but the one from last summer is my favorite so far. I have it in the fridge now and look forward to supper.
The baby watch is the event of the season! Best wishes to all!!!
We dip our sponge cake in sherry. And use jam, custard, set jelly and cream.
Such an old fashioned dessert, but lovely. We always have a trifle at Christmas time.
Here in New Zealand
We received some of that rain also! praise the Lord.
Sayings from earlier days:
“My get up and go, has got up and went!”
It has been very HOT here in SC PA but we did get a little rain shower last night and it is a wee bit cooler today. My son and I are going to power wash my sidewalks, front porch and back porch today. The heat is coming back tomorrow and the rest of the week so we are going to enjoy being out today. I watched the video of you making the Triffle and I do have your cookbook.
Tipper, I ate my first ripe tommy toe yesterday as I picked it and then walked around to the planter that had my snow peas and picked some of them right off the vine and ate them. You can’t get it any fresher than right from the plant and into your mouth:) Oh so good!!! Growing up I remember my Parents always saying “it was hotter than a two dollar pistol,” or “hot as blue blazes.”
We got unexpected rain overnight too. Needed badly, been dry as a bone in Waynesville.
My daughter requests a variation of this dessert for her birthday the past few years. Made with angel food cake, whipped cream, and strawberry pie filling. It’s a nice lighter dessert for summertime
Hello Tipper, I made the pound cake after watching your video. I didn’t get the trifle made but we had strawberries over the cake, it was so delicious! I’ll surely be making this again!
I watched the video when you made the blueberry trifle. It looked delicious.
I wish we would get rain! Going to be in the 90’s this week in my neck of the woods in NC.
We have tried for years to keep the deer out of our gardens. This year we ordered some solar powered alarms that are motion sensitive. If an animal comes near, they make noise like dogs barking and gun shots and sirens. So far this year they have worked. Maybe we will be dining on okra, beans and corn, instead of the critters eating it all. Another farmer told us that he has been using one of the motorized waving blowing around. guys that they have at the car lots . Says the deer don’t come near his garden any more. Oh, and the trifle looks delicious.
It rained here in Scaly too Tipper, Praise The Lord!!!! Now if we could have more night rains for about a week I think we would be back to near where we should be rain wise. So good for the gardens, farms and plants in general. Happy for you!
My granddaughter and her husband just found raspberry and blackberry bushes on their property they purchased recently. Don’t know about making a trifle but I see a blackberry cobbler in the future. I’ll be using your recipe on page 208! I also sent the recipe to Blair (granddaughter). She’s making one for tomorrow nights supper at my house
Thanks for the info on the Rogue!
I’m guessing trifle is usually served chilled? This recipe works well also in clear glass stem ware to make individual servings for special occasions or just because. This would be a good way to use our blackberries. By the way, Tipper, what is the connection between “trifle” and somebody being called “triflin”? I never heard of trifle the food growing up but I heard “triflin” a lot.
Ron it is usually served chilled 🙂 and I’m not sure about the trifling connection.
The trifle you made for Father’s Day looked so delicious. Trifles really are a simple and versatile dish. Happy you got some much needed rain.
I grew up in a home where eating berry recipes, especially black raspberries and mulberries, was common. Trifles, usually with tapioca, mixed berry pies (whatever we had), and berry cakes or muffins were normal spring and summer additions to our meals. We especially loved black raspberry thumbprint cookies and preserves, with seeds, which were everyone’s favorites. I miss those days where food was plentiful, healthy, free, and just outside the door, and it was fun for the whole family to gather, create recipes, and so enjoy the labors and rich traditions of God’s gardens, where humanity first drew breath. We’ve been doing this since the beginning of our earthly time.
My little garden got an about 1½ hour long shower Saturday. My new Rainbird sprinkler came in and I decided to try it out. I had replanted my corn and okree into dry dusty ground with the chances of rain being slim, so I made it rain. That brought out the okree overnight. I didn’t see any of the corn yesterday but I haven’t been to the garden yet this morning.
I also enjoy making a trifle.so good,easy,economical and feeds a crowd. Enjoyed the video last night, your garden is looking good. And I totally agree with Matt, give me a vehicle with a key,keep it simple. All the buttons and gadgets in a vehicle contribute to distracted driving. anxiously waiting for Corie’s baby. Continued good wishes.
Tipper–Strangely enough, that recipe probably has the longest direct geographical reach of any in our cookbook. I first ate a trifle (and it was made with raspberries) while in Edinburg, Scotland. I was there doing research for my dissertation, and to say that money was tight would be to put a highly positive spin on things. I was staying at an out of the way bed & breakfast establishment operated by two elderly sisters. They prepared a whopping breakfast–eggs, bangers, toast with marmalade, kippers, bacon, and fried potatoes. I stuffed myself every morning because that meant I could skip dinner.
I think the women realized as much, because the third morning one of them mentioned to me that they offered supper for a modest additional payment. My, was it fine, and the second night dessert was a raspberry trifle. I inquired, learned it was the essence of simplicity, and when it came to this cookbook many years and countless trifles later, inclusion seemed to me quite logical. After all, many of our food traditions and dishes come from Scotland, England, and Ireland.
Alas, haggis has not made much of a splash in crossing the Atlantic, but as someone who enjoys organ meats it’s a dish I love.
I should have included this background story with the recipe in the book, but here it is for the Blind Pig gang.
Jim Casada
You had me at berry trifle and then you had to say homemade pound cake and even homemade pudding in addition to wild and tasty berries! It’s too much for my retail grocer mind to truly take in! It’s like a tasty dream that’s come to reality and this is an easy recipe for a hot day I would think or even a birthday or other party! You bring this trifle and that will get the party started right there! If you don’t have the Appalachian cookbook Mr. Casada and Tipper penned, you may want to grab one for yourself and one for a special young engaged or married lady! I know I appreciate the recipes I’ve tried from this really nice cookbook and think you might too!!!! God bless you all and I hope we can get some gentle rain today….
I love making trifles. They are pretty simple and look so good too. Your Father’s Day one looked so very yummy.
Show my ignorance this morning, to me a “trifle” looks like a pie to this ole country boy!
Your corn looks like it is coming on good, now if you can keep the squirrels and coons out of it when it starts putting on the ears. I often fuss about this, in the last couple of nights, deer have completely destroyed everything in my garden, they have ate all of my green beans, crowder peas, squash and okra-nothing but the stems left. My tomatoes are in round cages made from cement reinforcement wire and my corn has tasseled. Deer have never bothered my green corn, only after any ears left on the stalks dry. They have not bothered these two things. I have 6 foot high chicken wire around garden and also scattered some other stinky stuff around the garden that was suppose to help, none of it did any good. The weather looks like it has set in to be another hot, dry summer. We have had no rain since the first days of June and temps around 90 degrees or more, tomorrow it is forecast to be 98 degrees. I told my son last night between my health (legs and back), hot weather and no rain and especially the DEER, I think I am through with trying to grow anything more than a few tomatoes plants. I will just buy anything we want at a local farmers market that sells produce grown by the owners.
I watched you make this pound cake and trifle on your you tube channel. It looked so good that it inspired me to make one for dessert yesterday. I had to make a few substitutions to use what I had on hand, but everyone loved it. Thank you for another delicious recipe. We got rain in WV last night too, and boy, did our garden need it. Our high today is going to be a comfortable 76…such a relief from all the heat lately.
We are just about done picking wild black raspberries that we moved into our yard and they were delicious when I cooked them in a cobbler! We had a real good crop this year and it looks like our blackberries are going to be a bumper crop this year. I can’t wait to make some jam out of them and of course a cobbler. Hopefully I have some left over to freeze.
My grandchildren request Trifle often for birthdays. I use angel food cake but will try pound cake next time. Mixed berries are good and recently I saw someone make banana pudding in a Trifle dish. That looked good except I’m used to having meringue on banana pudding and they used whipped cream.
I just got your cookbook and am looking forward to trying the recipes.
Lynette, does anyone still make banana pudding the old time Grandmother way? I mean make the custard in a double pots and make homemade meringue. This was a banana pudding that would make your tongue smack the roof of your mouth, I always ran my my tongue around the inside of my mouth to be sure I didn’t leave any in my mouth. Todays banana pudding made with instant pudding mix that has a few slices of bananas stuck in it and a cool whip topping is not banana pudding!
Randy I make banana pudding the old fashion way with meringue on top. It sure taste good right out of the oven!