Making It: Red, White, and Blue-Misu

Making It: Red, White, and Blue-Misu Image

This is the story of the first time I made Red, White, and Blue-misu. You might remember it as Niagara Produce’s recipe of the month for August. The recipe is very simple, and it was also a lot faster than I was expecting. First thing is whipping the cream. You can whip cream with a fork, but I was content with an electric mixer. Once the stiff peaks formed, in came the mascarpone cheese. I really like mascarpone cheese, but 16oz felt like a lot whilst folding it into the newly-whipped cream. Maybe I’m just a lazy cheese-folder. It later tasted like a great combination. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Once the cream/mascarpone concoction is together, you pretty much forget about it until you put it into the final bowl…unless you bought extra strawberries to eat on the side and you start stealing it for a topping. That is more likely to happen than not. Next came the berries. These were magnificent berries—and, may I say, they were 2/$5 at Niagara Produce—and I’ve already told you that I ate about a thousand of the strawberries with a dip of cream. I also had some strawberries with a piece of the dark chocolate bar. Anyway, I pureed half of the strawberries in an ancient blender that I’m pretty sure has seniority over me, and after fiddling with the thing for a short bit, I poured the strawberry puree over the unpureed strawberries, and mixed in the blueberries. Then we had a problem. I do not have a trifle dish, or even a transparent bowl. So, we improvised. It was a water pitcher, now it’s a dessert dish. Works for me.   First the cake:                 Then the berries:                 Then the cream:                 Then do it all again! Twice: And…oh yeah we forgot the most important part! CHOCOLATE! Note that this was done in a pitcher, so we had some extra. Never let it be said that you cannot improvise with these directions:           And then the OTHER most important part: Eating. How did it taste? Well, really good. It was very sweet, for a recipe without added sugar. It’s perfect for a family gathering on a hot day. It works for a picnic dessert, or a late snack on the porch.

Possible variations: You could probably experiment with some additional fruit like a banana or some melon. I love chocolate, so maybe this is just me, but adding some dark chocolate to each layer seems like a no-brainer. The chocolate on there now is great for eating the first layer, but it disappears quickly. Give this one a shot. Tell us how it goes at