Old Fashioned English Trifle Recipe with Port Wine Jelly – Christmas Dessert Under $2 a Serve
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Go retro with this classic English trifle recipe, perfect for Christmas dessert. Stay traditional or get creative endless variations.
The classic trifle dessert is always a favourite at Christmas time.
With layers of cake, custard, fruit and jelly, every spoonful is full of yumminess.
This is a great dessert to use up failed or leftover cake. If you have cake is dry, stale, or didn’t quite work out when you baked it – maybe it fell apart coming out of the tin – then it is the perfect candidate for becoming trifle.
Fairly Frugal Dessert for a Crowd
And despite it’s decadent appearance, this dessert isn’t too expensive coming in at under $2 per serve for eight people (although it can probably serve closer to 10).
At 2024 prices, shopping at my local Woolies, for jam roll, jelly, peaches, and custard, the total cost is $12.35. Substitute the peaches for two punnets of strawberries at $3 a punnet, and the total cost is $15.75.
I picked up this lovely glass bowl at a second-hand shop for $12. The lady at the counter told me it was perfect for Christmas trifle and then had a laugh when I told her that’s exactly what I was buying it for.
This doesn’t include the sherry because I figure most people have something stashed in the cupboard – it doesn’t have to be sherry.
I used 20-year-old strawberry liqueur from some long-forgotten cocktail night in my youth. You could use orange juice instead or leave it out altogether.
English Trifle Ingredients
Ingredients
Madeira cake or jam roll
sherry or orange juice
port wine jelly
vanilla custard
tinned peaches or fresh seasonal fruit
seasonal fruit to garnish
Substitutions
Traditional English trifle calls for Madeira cake, which you can purchase at the supermarket or make the Madeira cake yourself. Or you can switch it out for jam roll as I did, or a basic sponge cake from the supermarket.
Even a basic packet vanilla cake will work – that’s the beauty of trifle.
Switch the port jelly for strawberry or raspberry if you don’t like port.
Switch out the custard for mascarpone (which is cheap and easy to make at home) and the peaches for morello cherries soaked in kirsch for a delicious twist.
Or for an Australian summer variation, swap the port wine jelly with passionfruit jelly and the peaches with slices of fresh mango.
Drizzle the cake with orange juice for a non-alcoholic version or Cointreau for an adult version.
So many options!
Best made the day before so the cake can soak up the sherry/orange juice and get deliciously stodgy.
Serving Suggestions
There’s no getting around it, you can’t really serve this dessert in a visually appealing way.
So just spoon it into bowls, making sure to get a little bit of each layer.
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Old-Fashioned English Port Wine Trifle Recipe
Go retro with this classic English trifle recipe, perfect for Christmas dessert. Stay traditional or get creative endless variations.
Ingredients
- 2x 85g (3oz) packet of port wine jelly crystals
- 500mls of vanilla custard
- 250g Madeira cake, cubed or jam roll, sliced
- 1/3 cup sherry or orange juice
- 425g can of peach slices in syrup, drained reserve syrup (see variations - I used fresh strawberries)
- fresh seasonal fruit to garnish
Instructions
- Make jelly according to packet directions and pour into a shallow dish and refrigerate until almost set. (If you leave it, and it sets all the way, use a knife to slice through the jelly in the bowl, cutting it into rough cubes).
- Line a 2ltr glass bowl with 1/2 of the cake. Sprinkle cake with sherry.
- Top the cake with half the jelly, then the fruit, then top with half the custard.
- Add another layer of cake, sprinkle with sherry, then top with jelly, peaches, and remaining custard (depending on what fits in the bowl).
- Top with remaining peaches or fresh seasonal fruit.
Notes
Exchange the tinned peaches with tinned apricots or fresh fruit like strawberries (pictured). Strawberry jelly and strawberry liquor are nice in combination with the fresh fruit.
For a tropical variation, use passionfruit jelly and mangos. Madeira cake works best in this variation.
Nutrition Information:
Yield:
8Serving Size:
1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 401Total Fat: 2gSaturated Fat: 1gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 1gCholesterol: 41mgSodium: 330mgCarbohydrates: 61gFiber: 2gSugar: 40gProtein: 4g
Nutritional information is calculated automatically using the Nutritionix database. Nutrition information can vary for a recipe based on factors such as precision of measurements, brands, ingredient freshness, serving size or the source of nutrition data. We strive to keep the information as accurate as possible but make no warranties regarding its accuracy. We encourage readers to make their own calculations based on the actual ingredients used in your recipe, using your preferred nutrition calculator.
This delicious dessert is a evergreen favourite because of it’s versatility, cost-effectiveness, ease, and, of course, deliciousness.
Do you have a favourite trifle version? Share your top tips in the comments below.
Yum yum! I love trifle.
I also make a Choc Cherry version which goes down really well.
Substitute the port wine jelly with cherry flavoured jelly, the custard with chocolate instant pudding, the madeira cake with chocolate cake, the sherry with cherry brandy, and the peaches with a tin/jar of morello cherries, make it up the same as this trifle.
This is making me hungry!
I can’t wait to make this! Making one for this Sunday for my son’s 1st birthday party for all my family! Thanks for sharing!