Chocolate Brownie Trifle

 
Ever get those intense cravings for the chocolately-ist chocolate dessert imaginable? By the way, if you don't, sorry, I just can't relate. This Chocolate Brownie Trifle will hit the spot and is absolutely gorgeous when layered in a pretty glass trifle dish. How can you go wrong with brownies, chocolate pudding and whipped cream? My mom made this dessert for a scrap-booking party we had with some friends and us ladies went nuts over it. I literally ate it by the plateful, so naturally, I had to have the recipe.

The great thing about this dessert, besides being fantastically yummy and pretty, is that it makes A LOT. When my husband and I had ten of his friends over (including their little ones) for a dinner party I whipped this up and still had some leftover afterward.

My mom found the recipe on one of our favorite sites: allrecipes.com. If you look it up on the website you'll see that my instructions below are slightly different, as I modified it to incorporate the site's recipe reviewers' suggestions. When you decide to make this (notice I say when, not if), make sure to allow plenty of time for chilling - at least 8 hours.

Prep Time: 30 minutes (about 10 minutes more if you make your own whipping cream)

Cook Time: 25 minutes

Ready In: 8 hours, 55 minutes

Serves: 12

Ingredients:

1 (19.8 ounce) package brownie mix

1 (3.9 ounce) package instant chocolate pudding mix

1/2 cup water (or you can use coffee in place of water to intensify the chocolate flavor, as I did)

1 (14 ounce) can sweetened condensed milk

1 (8 ounce) container frozen whipped topping, thawed (or you can use 1/2 pint heavy cream and 3 tablespoons of sugar to make your own, as I did)

1 (12 ounce) container frozen whipped topping, thawed (I used french vanilla flavor instead of regular but any kind you like is fine)

1 (1.5 ounce) bar chocolate candy

Raspberries or strawberries for garnish (optional)

Directions:

1. Prepare brownie mix according to package directions and cool completely. Cut into 1 inch squares.

2. In a large bowl, combine pudding mix, water (or coffee) and sweetened condensed milk. Mix until smooth, then fold in 8 ounces whipped topping until no streaks remain. To make your own whipped topping, combine 1/2 pint heavy cream and 3 tablespoons of sugar in a very cold bowl (tip - put your bowl and beaters in the freezer to chill them quickly). Whip until you achieve the desired consistency, which typically takes about 10 minutes. If you have the time to spare, I recommend refrigerating this pudding mixture for a little while before layering in the trifle dish to prevent it from getting runny.

3. In a trifle bowl or glass serving dish, place one-third of the brownies, one-third of the pudding mixture and one-third of the 12 ounce container of whipped topping. Repeat layers. I added fresh raspberries on top, which added a beautiful burst of color and great taste. Strawberries would also work well. Then, shave chocolate onto top layer for garnish. Refrigerate for 8 hours before serving.

Enjoy! PMS is no match for this dessert :)