Insane Trifle

Trifles baffle me.  How on earth can they be so large?  This recipe is for a massive Japanese-inspired Neapolitan trifle.  I found the recipe for the lady fingers I made here.  As I made some changes to the recipe, I will post my process for making the lady fingers on my blog.
The procedure looks daunting as ever, but really, it takes three or four hours of speedy work from start to finish.
As a warning, this recipe requires a lot of bowls that are filled with almost identical ingredients.  In my ingredients section, I have a couple posts written like, "(x+y+z)cups".  They are meant to be read as, "x cups, y cups, z cups, in separate bowls".

Ingredients:

For the lady fingers:

♕(2+2 heaping+2 heaping+2.5)T/(18+20+20+16)g white flour, separated
♕1t/2g matcha
♕2t/4g cacao powder
♕1t/3.5mL vanilla extract
♕5 strawberries, juiced, no pulp

♕(2+2.5+3 heaping)T/(25+40+30)g sugar
♕4 small sized (in America, they're called "medium") eggs, separated and at room temperature
♕0.5t/2mL lemon juice

For the whipped cream:
note: when I made this recipe it fit into a 2 gallon glass bowl.  I realize that this is a lot of cream.  Do not be alarmed.

♕2 quarts/2.3L heavy whipping cream
♕(3/4+3/4+3/4+3/4+3/4) cup/(150+150+150+150+150)g sugar (that's five times 3/4 cup/150g)
♕3T/15g cacao powder
♕2T/10g matcha powder
♕left over reduced strawberry juice
♕2T/30mL vanilla extract, high quality

For the rest of the trifle:

♕1 bag lady fingers or other dry cookies
note: I had to buy cookies because I seriously miscalculated the amount of lady fingers I would end up baking.  As an informed reader, you have options regarding which cookies you want to use with this recipe:
1) triple or even quadruple the recipe for the lady fingers, depending on how many people you are feeding, and use them as the only cookies in this trifle
2) purchase cookies at the store.  Looking back, if I could, I would buy thin disk-like cookies in strawberry, green tea, vanilla, and chocolate flavors for an excellent Neapolitan look.
3) you could buy all your cookies, but where's the fun in that?
4) just use less cookies in the recipe, instead opting to fill the dish with more mochi (especially if you can buy it in blocks, and cut it into long, 2cm wide rectangles!) and berries
♕1/2 cup/150g dark chocolate chips
♕1/2 cup/150g white chocolate chips
♕200-400g/0.5-1lb mochi, unstuffed and preferably without any flavoring, either in bites or in blocks

Procedure:

For the lady fingers:

♕Prepare two baking sheets lined with parchment paper, and a piping bag (or four, if you don't want to rewash you bag while baking) with a narrow tip
♕Preheat oven to 350˚F/180˚C
♕Juice your berries, and place them into a small saucepan with the 2T sugar.  Stir, and reduce over low heat for approximately 20 minutes.  Your goal is to get a syrup.
♕Get four bowls.  Into two of them, sift 20g white flour.  Into one of them, sift 16g flour, and sift 18g flour into the last one.  ♕Keep track of which bowl is which!
♕Take your separated egg yolks and beat them with the 30g sugar for approximately five minutes, until glossy and pale.
♕Beat the egg whites, lemon juice, and 40g sugar on high speed until stiff peaks form.
♕Into your cocoa powder bowl, pour one fourth of the egg yolks and top with one fourth of the egg whites.  Fold the mixture together until just combined, pour into the piping bag, and pipe lady finger-length strips.  Leave about 1cm between each cookie, they do not spread much.
note: you could be like me, and pipe thin, 4cm long cookies, or you could be bold, piping them long and thick
♕Bake for 8-10 minutes, turning the tray halfway through the baking process if you have the slightest suspicion that your oven doesn't bake evenly.

♕While the chocolate lady fingers bake, combine the egg yolks with your 20g flour and egg whites.
♕Add in the vanilla extract and fold the ingredients together.
♕Pipe onto your other baking sheet, and as soon as your chocolate cookies are done, bake for 8-10 minutes.
♕Place the chocolate cookies under a cotton cloth, off of their baking tray but still on their parchment paper.

♕Combine the egg yolks, other 20g flour, and egg whites.
♕Add 2tsp or so of your reduced strawberry syrup, and food coloring, if you so wish
note: I did.
♕Fold together, pipe, and bake for 8-10 minutes.

♕Combine final egg yolks, final flour bowl, and egg whites.
♕Fold together, pipe, bake for 8-10 minutes.

♕If you bake the cookies the day you will assemble the trifle, your cookies will be soft, but they will still absorb much of the whipped cream.  You could also bake them in advance and let them go stale for a crunchy cookie.

For the whipped cream:

♕Divide the 2 quarts of whipping cream into rough fifths.
♕As you whip each fifth, add 150g sugar.
♕To one fifth, add the cacao powder
♕To one fifth, add the vanilla extract.
♕To one fifth, add the matcha powder
♕To one fifth, add the remaining strawberry syrup
♕To one fifth, add nothing more.
♕From each whipped batch, save for the one with no flavor additions, reserve about 1 coffee mugworth of cream and refrigerate.

Assembly:

♕Melt the chocolate chips
♕If you purchased mochi blocks instead of mochi bites, slice them in an appealing manner.
♕Layer lady fingers, cookies, mochi and sliced strawberries loosely in a tall dish.  Drip melted chocolate on top.
♕Cover with plain whipped cream (except for the reserved coffee mugworth)
♕Make a total of five layers of cookies, being certain to line the walls of your dish with cookies, strawberries, and mochi.  Top each layer with a different flavor of whipped cream.
note: something I thought of only after assembling the trifle was that melted chocolate could be used as a cement to keep the lady fingers and other components sticking to the wall of your trifle dish, as well as their base.
♕After you have made five layers, your dish should be almost full.  Take out your four mugwoths of flavored whipped cream and plop them down in four mounds.
♕Top with melted chocolate, mochi, cookies, strawberries, and whatever else you wish.
♕Serve immediately if you like crunchy trifle, or let it sit in the cold for about two hours to let the cream get into the cookies.

Dark Chocolate Strawberry Truffles

These truffles were surprisingly successful.  They have an interesting fruity aroma that can be attributed to the walnuts and strawberries working in tandem.  They are completely raw, vegan, and have about 20 minutes of hands-on time.

Ingredients:

♕ 1 cup/150g walnuts
♕ 4 strawberries
♕ 5T/45g cacao powder note: I used cacao powder without any sugar, but with vanillin added.  If you do want to add a vanilla aroma to your truffles, either use vanilla enriched cacao powder (if you have it), or add powdered vanillin.  the recipe will be too wet to accept liquid vanilla extract.
♕ 2t/6g molasses
♕ 2 T/20g agave
♕ 3T/45mL coconut oil

♕ pinch salt
♕ splash strong, unsweetened coffee
♕ 1 cup/100g cacao nibs or unsweetened coconut flakes note: with the cacao nibs these truffles become less sweet than if you just ate the batter.  If you are fond of a higher sweet:bitter ratio in chocolate treats, you can either add more sweetener or roll the truffles in both cane sugar and cacao nibs.



Procedure:

♕ Soak the walnuts overnight.
♕ In a food processor, combine all ingredients save for the cacao nibs or coconut flakes.  Process into a smooth paste.
♕ Scoop out teaspoon-sized balls of your paste and roll in the cacao nibs or coconut flakes.
♕ Refrigerate for at least two hours, or freeze for at least 10 minutes.
♕ Serve with coffee.

Rhubarb Fool

There are lots of recipes for fruit fools, and to complicate things further, some people even spell fool "foole".  But regardless of spelling, as a rule, fool(e)s are easy to make successfully.

Ingredients:

♕ 1.5 lb/700g rhubarb stalks
♕ 1/3 cup+1 T+1t/70g+15g+5g cane sugar
♕ 1/4 cup+1T/80g+25g honey note: if I had real maple syrup, I'd use that instead!
♕ 1T/15mL good vanilla extract
♕ just over 1/2 cup/125g whipping cream
♕ 5 strawberries, sliced

Procedure:

♕ Place a medium-large mixing bowl, preferably metal, and a mixer attachment into your freezer.
♕ Cut your rhubarb into 1 inch/2cm long bits
♕In a pot, cover rhubarb and 80g honey + 70g sugar with boiling water.  Stew on medium-high heat for 3 minutes.
♕ Remove 3/4 cup/220g rhubarb, approximately, from the water and set aside.  Pour off any liquid that you can, but do be gentile with the cubes, as you do not want them to become a stringy mess.
♕ Continue to stew remaining rhubarb for about five more minutes, then use a colander or sieve to separate the matter from the liquid.  With this batch, do not worry about preserving the chunks, they will become mash and that's alright.  Drain the liquid as well as you can and place the rhubarb into a bowl.  Stir in 25g honey. 
♕ Make the whipped cream by getting your frozen bowl and mixer attachment, pouring the 125g of cream into the bowl, and whipping for approximately 7 minutes.  Start on low speed and gradually increase it, adding vanilla and 15g sugar (cane if you like rough texture, plain white or powdered if you want smooth whipped cream) just before the cream begins to form peaks.  Be careful not to overwhip!
♕ Spoon about half of the whipped cream into the mashed rhubarb, mix, and place on the bottom layer of your serving bowl.  Top with sliced strawberries.  Place unmashed rhubarb on top of that, and dust with 5g sugar.  Garnish with remaining strawberry slices, and whipped cream. note: if you have rum raisins, I suggest breaking them out for this recipe as well. 
♕ Refrigerate ASAP


♕ Done!