Mascarpone Trifle

Mascarpone Trifle

Perfect for summer, our mascarpone trifle is juicy, sweet, creamy, and savory. Serve this up with a tall pitcher of sangria, and your favorite summer pasta salad. A trifle dish makes a beautiful presentation, and the best part is, leftovers are easy to store...not that there will be any!

Ingredients:

Cake:
1 vanilla cake mix
3 eggs
Oil (follow box instructions plus 1/4 cup extra)
Water (follow box instructions)
2 teaspoons of vanilla
Vanilla pudding mix

Fruit and fruit glaze:
2 kiwis, peeled and sliced
2 seedless clementines, peeled and sliced or wedged
5 strawberries, sliced
1 jar of peach marmalade
1/2 shot of liqueur (we used limoncello)

Mascarpone:
1 8 oz. package of mascarpone
1 small box of white chocolate, vanilla, or french vanilla pudding mix
2 cups of cold milk (for pudding)

Directions:

Fruit glaze:
Add jar of marmalade and a half of a shotglass of liqueur to sauce pan. Bring to a boil while stirring. Turn off heat and allow to cool.

Mascarpone:
In a small mixing bowl, repare pudding mix, and place in refrigerator to set. Once set, add container of mascarpone to pudding, and mix well.

Cake:
In a large mixing bowl, prepare cake mix as per instructions. Add two teaspoons of vanilla, and about a 1/4 cup more oil. Add pudding mix. Mix well until thoroughly blended. Pour evenly into two greased 8" round cake pans, and bake at 350 degrees for 35 min. Remove cakes from oven, and allow to cool.

Assemble your trifle:

Cut about a 1/2 inch around the edge of cake to seperate the edge. Remove cake from pan, and place bottom side up into trifle. Poke holes in cake, and drizzle 3/4 of the marmalade over cake. Add half of the mascarpone mix to almost the edges of the trifle. When the next cake layer is added, it will push mascarpone layer outward. Cut around edge of second cake layer, and place on top of your mascarpone layer, bottom side up. Add remaining mascarpone, and spread evenly to the edges of the trifle.

Now, get creative!
Arrange fruit on top of cake in a decorative pattern: We added strawberries in the middle, forming a circle; next we added a ring of clementines; next we added a ring of kiwi. A good rule of thumb is to eyeball how much of each fruit you have, and add the least amount in the middle, followed by the second least; then add the most amount of fruit around the outside. You could arrange a striped pattern of each type of fruit. You could even alternate pieces of fruit in a pretty circular pattern. Last, brush fruit with remaining marmalade to glaze.

Place trifle in refrigerator to chill for two hours.