Drambuie Cream Peach Trifle

Ingredients:

2 8" yellow cake layers, sliced in half horizontally.
3 16 oz. bags of frozen peaches, thawed
1/2 - 3/4 cup sugar depending on how sweet you like your fruit
juice of 1 lemon
8 oz of frozen raspberries or blueberries
1/4 cup + 1 tablespoon Drambuie
8 egg yolks
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/2 cup whipping cream
sprig of fresh mint, for garninsh if available
1 1/2 cups juice from sugared peaches (see instructions below) or bottled peach nectar

Cooking Instructions:

To give credit where it's due, the inspiration for this was Emily Luchetti's
chocolate-zabaglione trifle ("Four Star Desserts").
Be sure to allow a mininum 6 hours of chilling time before serving.
The day before the trifle is to be assembled, sprinkle the lemon
juice and the tablespoon of Drambuie on the peaches and toss with the
1/2 - 3/4 cup sugar. Let sit overnight, in the refrigerator. The idea is
to generate juice from the peaches. If you are in a hurry,let the peaches
sit in the sugar, lemon juice and Drambuie for about an hour and buy a good
bottled peach nectar. The peaches will be firmer in the trifle if you do
it this way.

Fill a medium bowl with ice water and set aside. The cream is made like
zabaglione, but with a combination of Drambuie and peach juice instead of
Marsala. Add some of the juice from the sugared peaches (or peach nectar) to
1/4 cup of Drambuie to make 3/4 cup. Whisk this with the 1/2 cup of sugar
and the 8 egg yolks in a double boiler. If you don't have a double boiler,
use a metal bowl set over a pan of simmering water, making certain that the
bowl does not touch the water. Whisk until doubled in volume and thickened.
Set the thickened custard into the bowl of ice water, and whisk until cooled.
Whip the cream into soft peaks, and fold the cooled custard into the whipped
cream. (Obviously, this is NOT for the cholesterol-conscious!) Place about
a cup of the cream in the bottom of the trifle dish. Place a half-layer of
cake over this. (You may have to cut and fit the cake, depending on your
trifle dish.) Brush the cake liberally with the juice from the peaches, or
peach nectar. Place a ring of peach slices around the outside, wide side out,
and place berries between the peach slices on the outside, so that they show
through the glass. Fill in the center with peach slices and sprinkle a few
berries in with them. Add another cup of cream over the peaches, then put in
another half-layer of cake, and brush with peach juice. Continue building
up the trifle this way, until you have 3 or 4 cake/cream/peach/berry layers
(depending on the height of your trifle bowl). Top the trifle with the cream,
and chill for at least 6 hours. When ready to serve, place peach slices
upside-down in a circle so that they look like the petals of a flower. In
the center of the flower, put a few berries. A sprig of fresh mint, if you
can get it, looks really pretty on this.

Theoretically this serves about 10 - 12, but your mileage may vary. People
typically take a small amount at first, because it looks so rich, but they
almost always come back "for just a little more". If you want people to
"dig in", take out about a scoop before you set it out, because people are
reluctant to disturb it. After that, it won't last an hour.

Variation that I have not tried yet: This would probably taste really good
using ginger cake instead of yellow cake.