Coffee and Donut Trifle

At one of our churches we would meet together during the week in a small group called "Community"

I loved developing this recipe! 

groups. It was a wonderful time and we often had a dinner theme.  Everyone brought something to eat and, sometimes, we had a "breakfast dinner" or "brinner". It was a lot of fun, especially when the Pastor made his gigantic Belgian waffles! I'm normally the "dessert person" who brings the big dessert. But what to take for a breakfast dinner? Fruit and cream trifle sounded good. But we all needed a "wake me up" I thought. So, I came up with Coffee and Donuts in the form of a trifle! This was a lot of fun to figure  out and even more fun to watch others enjoy. I never had any leftovers at the end of the meal on this one!

• 5 cups heavy whipping cream (divided)
• 1 cup strong coffee *
• 4 tbsp cornstarch
• 1/2 tsp fine salt
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 ¼ tbsp cinnamon (divided, with the ¼ tbsp to the side)
•  2 tbsp powdered sugar
•  ¼ tsp nutmeg
• 1-2 dozen donut cake donut holes (flavor of your choice) or mini donuts

First make the coffee cream:

1. In a heavy saucepan combine the 3 cups of heavy cream and the coffee, place on medium heat and bring to the simmer, simmer for around 2 minutes, stirring constantly. 
2. Turn off heat.
3. In a small bowl, whisk together the cornstarch, salt, brown sugar and 1 tsp of the cinnamon. You may need to use a fork to smash out any brown sugar lumps.
4. Add the above mixture to the coffee and cream in the saucepan and bring to the boil over medium-high heat.
5. Let the mixture thicken and reduce heat to simmer and continue whisking for 1 more minute until its thick and coats the back of a metal spoon very well.
6. Turn off the heat and set aside to cool to room temperature.
7. Once cooled, cover with plastic wrap and place in the fridge to chill 6 hours or overnight. Make sure to press the plastic wrap into the top of the mixture to prevent skin from forming if doing this overnight.

Now the Whipping cream.

1. Most of the time people think that whipping cream is fine if its just fluffy. But for this (and some other recipes) where you want the filling to stay firm, you need to whip your heavy cream almost to the butter stage. You can tell when you get there because it will look less like a fluffy cloud and more like its becoming whipped butter. Just don't go too far or you WILL get butter!
2. Whisk together your remaining cinnamon, the nutmeg and the powdered sugar.
3. At this point you could also add in some instant coffee for an extra kick (around 1 tbsp).
4. Begin the process of whipping the cream. When it starts coming together, add in the dry flavorings. Then keep whipping until done.

(Tip: to keep everyone nice and stable, pre-chill your mixing bowl!)

The Assembly

1.  Cut your donut holes or baby donuts in half (cross wise if donuts) and layer the bottom of the dish.
2.  Next layer in the coffee cream  followed by some whipping cream.
3.  Repeat and finish with the last of the whipped cream.
4. You can decorate the top with leftover donuts or cocoa nibs or whatever!
5. Keep refrigerated until ready to use.

I make mine overnight so that everything has a chance to marry up and become one happy family!

* STRONG COFFEE. For $2.30 I was able to get some very strong coffee at Starbucks. I don't have any regular coffee in our house (we aren't big coffee people) so I had to get it somewhere. Just ask for their strongest blend, no creamer, sugar or anything else. Just straight up!

Put those cocoa nibs on top!