Individual Red Velvet Trifles

Happy Christmas Eve! I always like to make individual desserts for this series since technically it's only two of us eating the finished product. The original recipe made a large trifle if that's your preference, or you can make as many individual servings as you need.

We baked the cake the night before preparing these, and the recipe was incredibly easy to put together. Since these trifles are in much smaller dishes than the original, I simplified the recipe so that all of the ingredients would fit into the smaller dish. That meant skipping some of the original suggested ingredients, if you're making yours larger, you can also make it more grand by adding those things back into the trifle. The original makes twelve servings, mine will make four.

Have a wonderful evening and holiday celebrating with friends and family! 

Pair With:

Baked Brie with Maple Roasted Cranberries
Cranberry Molasses Mulled Wine
Italian Roasted Vegetables
Sweet Potato Gnocchi with Rosemary Parmesan Cream

Cake recipe from Hershey's, Trifle Recipe heavily adapted from Hershey's.

Ingredients:

Trifles

-One-third Hershey's Red Velvet Cake (recipe follows)

-1 package cheesecake pudding mix (3.4 oz. each)

-Small package of chocolate sandwich cookies, (I used about two sleeves from the smaller package), crushed

-Hershey kisses, three to top each trifle

-Ghiradelli peppermint bark

Hershey's Red Velvet Cake
-1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine, softened

-1-1/2 cups sugar

-2 eggs

-1 teaspoon vanilla extract

-1 cup buttermilk or sour milk*

-2 tablespoons (one 1-oz. bottle) red food color

-2 cups all-purpose flour

-1/3 cup HERSHEY'S Cocoa

-1 teaspoon salt

-1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda

-1 tablespoon vinegar

For The Trifle:

Prepare the Hershey's Red Velvet Cake and allow to cool completely -- this is perfect to do the night before serving. Crumble one third of cake into pieces. Wrap remaining cake for another use (cake balls would be a perfect use).

Prepare cheesecake pudding according to package directions; refrigerate until ready to assemble trifle. Remove wrappers from milk chocolates and peppermint bark.

A trifle is built in layers, so you want to make sure that each layer can clearly be seen from outside of the bowl. Place an even layer of red velvet cake crumbs in the bottom of each individual glass (this will vary depending on what size/shape of glass you use); followed by cookie crumbs; followed by pudding; followed by red velvet cake.

Since my trifle dishes were relatively shallow, this is where I was done. If you're using a taller container, repeat the layers (always ending with cake) until the glass dish is full.

Garnish trifle with Hershey kisses and peppermint bark. 

For the Hershey's Red Velvet Cake:

Recipe created for The Hershey Company by Mommy Hates Cooking.

1. Heat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour 9x13 pan.

2. Beat butter and sugar in large bowl; add eggs and vanilla, beating well. In another bowl, stir together the buttermilk and red food color. In a third bowl, stir together flour, cocoa and salt; add alternately to butter mixture with buttermilk mixture, mixing well. Stir in baking soda and vinegar. Pour into the greased and floured 9x13.

3. Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool completely.