Gluten Free, Vegan Chocolatey Christmassy Tifle!!

December has arrived!  Sure, my Christmas tree has been up for three weeks already, and I've already had a Christmas party, but now we've hit that final month on the calendar, I feel like I can really let my Christmas Freak Flag fly! I don't know how I became such a Christmas geek, but if four consecutive holiday seasons working in retail can't jade me, I don't think anything ever will!
Being English-born, I have a complex idea of what the spirit of Christmas really is.  Yes, I think of barbecues, pavlovas and cold beers as essentials of the big day, but I still have fond, if distant, memories, of the English school Christmas lunch, in which we all sat around long tables in the dining hall and ate turkey and overcooked brussels sprouts inbetween snowman-building competitions. And while I don't know yet if a box of Scorched Almonds is more "Christmassy" than a Terry's Chocolate Orange, I do know that the magic of Christmas and the peace of a New Zealand summer are a pretty damn good fit!

At the "Friendmas" dinner I recently hosted, I asked everyone to bring along their must-have Christmas dish in the hopes of a bountiful Christmas-themed potluck, and to find out which foods bring out the most nostalgia. I was really excited to see what everyone would bring until I realised that I too would have to make a decision about what to make!  Ok, what Christmas dish can I not live without? From the title of this post, you'd assume the answer is "trifle" but it's not that simple!
After careful consideration, I decided the two things that make Christmas day different to every other are 1) socially acceptable day-drinking and 2) desserts all damn day.  And since I'm both unwilling to just serve up booze at a dinner party and personally living alcohol-free right now, I had to settle for dessert (poor me!).  At home, we've never had a "standby" or "must have" Christmas dessert. Instead we rotate between Christmas pudding (the brandy-soaked, ablaze kind), berry-filled pavlova or some kind of cake+cream/custard combo, if not a combination of all of the above.  It's worth mentioning that this is after eating pancakes for breakfast and a half-box each of Rose's chocolates for lunch! Well, if you can't on Christmas day, when can you?
Instead of trying to pick one dessert to serve, I found the answer in trifle - basically all the desserts you can think of, artfully piled on top of one another. It hits all the right flavour notes - chocolate, booze, berries, plus all those wintry-warm spices - while being gluten-free, (mostly) alcohol-free, and suitable for vegans. Winning!

Components:
Cake
Spiced toffee sauce
Ganache
Berries
Custard
Cream

Cake
I used this recipe, which is gluten free and vegan, and used Countdown's "free from" brand gluten-free plain flour mix. It's a nice, simple recipe - no flaxseed eggs or funky techniques. It's not the most stunning cake, fresh from the oven I'd describe it's texture as... "bouncy"... but it tastes pretty good and fits the bill for this dessert! I switched the vanilla essence for brandy flavoured essence to add a bit of a Christmas kick without the alcohol content of the real thing. While the essence is only 3.9% alcohol so equivalent to putting a spoonful of beer in the whole cake, I would omit this step if serving someone who must be 100% alcohol free.  Make the cake a few days ahead to lighten the workload on the day.

Spiced Toffee Sauce
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
5 whole cloves
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

Combine the sugar and water in a pan and heat on medium-high heat until the sugar has completely dissolved.  There should be enough sugar to completely saturate the water, so it will take some time to dissolve it all. Once the sugar is dissolved, bring the syrup to a fast boil for two or three minutes to thicken everything a little more. Take the pan off the heat and allow to cool for ten minutes before adding the spices, they will steep in the hot syrup like tea.  Leave to cool at room temperature before transferring or using - it will be mega hot! Once cooled you can use straight away or store in a jar in the fridge for a few weeks.
Extra for experts: use the plain syrup to make candied citrus peels, then add the spices when the peels are removed but the syrup is still hot.  The syrup will have an extra zingy citrus flavour and you'll have another impressive looking homemade sweet to add to the dinner table.


Berries
Any will do!  I used the supermarket brand mixed frozen berries to save $$ but fresh would also work really well.  Avoid tinned berries as they will be far too moist and squishy!  You will need three cups of berries, minimum.

Ganache
200mL coconut cream
50g dairy free chocolate e.g. Whittaker's 50% cocoa Dark Block, roughly chopped

Ganache seems to scare people away, but making a vegan ganache is actually really easy and there's a lot you can do with it!  In a small saucepan heat half a tin of coconut cream (i.e. 200mL) until just boiling.  Remove the saucepan from the heat.  Add in chocolate (I usually use the dark block range from Whittaker's) and leave to sit for ten minutes. Next, stir in the melty chocolate until it is completely blended with the cream and has a smooth, thick sauce consistency. And that's it - not so daunting, huh?

Custard
For the custard, it's a bit of a cheat.  Real custard, made with whole eggs, egg yolks, cream and milk is absolutely the bee's knees but of course it wouldn't be very vegan would it? It's also time consuming and hard to get right on the first try. Instead, I used Edmond's Custard Powder, following the packet instructions but subbing in 2 tins of coconut milk (800mL liquid altogether).  I want to be able to say that you could use any non-dairy milk for this but I think honestly that rice, oat and almond milk wouldn't be creamy enough to set properly and that soy would be too strongly flavoured. Make the custard a few hours ahead of time so that it can cool without setting completely.

Assembly
Cut the cake into cubes and place in the bottom of a pretty glass serving bowl.

Pour a 1/4 cup of the spiced syrup over top, cover with the berries, and smoosh down until the berries, cake and syrup fill all the gaps in the bottom of the bowl and it has a level surface.  Allow to sit in the fridge for one hour.

Attractive!

Next, spoon over the warm ganache.
Add another two tablespoons of syrup, swirl it over the ganache. Chill half an hour.

Next, pour over the custard - spoon the custard to the edges of the bowl to form a seal over the ganache and cake.  Cover with clingfilm (let the clingfilm touch the surface of the custard) and chill in the fridge until completely set, will be one hour minimum.

Just before serving, garnish as desired. I used sliced strawberries and grated chocolate and served with a side jug of coconut cream. Be creative!
Serves 8