Pumpkin Trifle

I love baking sweets!! Especially now that my kitchen is finished from the renovation. Last week, I made Chocolate Pumpkin Chocolate Chip muffins (mmm!) and had half a can of pumpkin left over. Since I was having company over for Sunday dinner, I wanted to make something for dessert, plus I had those leftovers to use. After looking in my pantry, I had a box of white cake mix, a vanilla pudding mix, and some Cool Whip. And thus the idea for Pumpkin Trifle was born. I'm sure that someone else has made this before, but here's my recipe.

Cake:
1 box white cake mix + ingredients on package directions
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon ginger
1 teaspoon nutmeg

Filling:
15-16 oz can of cooked pumpkin
1 block cream cheese, softened
1 box vanilla pudding
1 1/2 cups milk
White chocolate chips

Topping:
Cool Whip

Directions:
1. Mix cake according to package directions, adding spices to flavor.
2. Pour cake into a 12 x 17 pan, lined with tinfoil for easy removal.
3. Cook cake about 15-20 minutes, keeping a close watch since it will bake much quicker with a thin layer in the bigger pan.
4. While cake is baking, beat softened cream cheese until smooth, then add pumpkin and beat until smooth.
5. Add vanilla pudding mix and milk to pumpkin mixture, and beat 2-3 minutes. Place mixture in fridge to set up.
6. After cake is cooked and cooled, lift out of pan with tinfoil and onto a cutting surface. Use a long bread knife to cut the cake into 1-inch squares.
7. In a large glass trifle dish, layer about half of the cake squares. Add white chocolate chips around the edge to show along the dish. Sprinkle  chips some in the middle too!
8. Layer half the pumpkin filling on top of the cake and chocolate chips, being sure to be careful along  the edges where the layers will show.
9. Repeat layers, topping the trifle in the middle with Cool Whip. For garnish, add a dash of cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger across the top of the Cool Whip.
10. Chill and serve. It's just fine to chill overnight.

Notes on Substituting: 1) You could probably substitute a spice cake  mix for the white cake mix plus spices, but I just used white cake mix since that is what I had. 2) You could probably substitute  butterscotch or cinnamon chips for the white chocolate (again, white chocolate is what I had in the pantry). 3) You can use a 9 x 13, but you will just have to work harder when it's time to cut the cake into squares because you need the cake pieces to be 1-inch squares. 4) I don't think it would be a problem to leave out the cream cheese if you don't have it. However, you might want to double the amount of pudding mix and milk to have enough filling.

Here's the process in pictures: