How to Make a Rainbow Trifle Dessert for a Magical Party

Today, we are going to be sharing a delicious and colorful rainbow trifle dessert recipe that is sure to impress your guests! This dessert is made up of layers of cake, pudding, whipped cream, and cookies, and it is perfect for any special occasion.

A rainbow trifle is ideal for St. Patrick’s Day, unicorn parties, baby showers, or any celebration with a rainbow theme or lots of color.

Rainbow Cake Trifle Layered Dessert

This festive rainbow trifle dessert is the perfect way to add some color to your special occasion. This delicious layered dessert contains a combination of cake, pudding, whipped cream, and cookies.

With its bright colors and irresistible flavors, it is sure to impress your guests with its unique presentation. Not only is this recipe easy to make, but it also requires pretty simple ingredients.

Whether you’re serving up a special treat for a birthday party or adding to a large dessert table, this rainbow trifle dessert is sure to be a hit. Make sure to check out our funfetti birthday trifle, too.

Rainbow Trifle Ingredients

Here’s what you need to make this happy recipe. The measurements are in the recipe card below.

• Box of white cake mix and the ingredients to make it. Make sure you have everything you need to make the box of cake mix of your choice.
• Instant vanilla pudding. Get a box of vanilla, French vanilla, or white chocolate pudding. Keep in mind that this will change the color of the trifle a bit.
• Milk. I use 2%. Use your milk of choice to make pudding.
• Whipped topping. Thawed Cool Whip or your choice of whipped topping.
• Nilla wafers. You can also use your choice of rainbow cookie. It’s best to use a crunchy cookie.
• White candy melts.
• Sanding sugar in pink, yellow, green, blue, and violet
• Wilton color gels in pink, lemon yellow, kelly green, sky blue, and velvet.

Layered Rainbow Dessert Directions

Step One: Prepare

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F and grease two baking sheets with nonstick cooking spray.

Set aside five wafer cookies for the topping and crush the rest for the layers.

Step Two: Make the Cake

Prepare the cake mix according to the directions on the package.

Divide the cake batter evenly into five small bowls.

Color each bowl using the color gels. Make each bowl a different color of the rainbow.

Pour the pink and yellow cake batter into one of the prepared pans. Bake for 6-8 minutes or until the edges begin to brown. Do the toothpick test to make sure they are done. The cake will be very thin. Let them cool completely.

My pans are 12.5″ x 17″, which might be bigger than standard pans. If you use smaller pans, you will need to bake them longer.

Pour the green, blue, and purple cake batter into the second prepared baking pan and bake for 8-10 minutes or until the edges start to brown like above. Let them cool completely.

Step Three: Make the Pudding

Mix together the pudding and milk and whisk well. Refrigerate for 5 minutes or until set.

Step Four: Color the Cookies

Melt the candy melts according to the directions on the package.

Dip the wafer cookies halfway into the melted candy and sprinkle them with one of the colors of sanding sugar.

Repeat until you have one cookie of each color.

Place the cookies onto wax paper and let them set and harden.

Place two scoops of whipped topping into a 12″ pastry bag fitted with a large star tip and set aside.

Step Five: Assemble the Trifle

Use a fork to scrape the cake into crumbs, keeping each color separate.

Start with the purple cake and sprinkle into the bottom of the trifle bowl.

Next add half of the vanilla pudding and spread it evenly on top of the purple cake.

Sprinkle on a layer of crushed vanilla wafer cookies.

Add the blue cake and follow with half of the whipped topping.

Continue with the green cake and the rest of the pudding.

Add the rest of the crushed cookies.

Add the yellow cake and the rest of the whipped topping.

Sprinkle on the pink cake.

Use the reserved whipped topping in the pastry bag to pipe five round dollops on top of the trifle.

Gently press one cookie into each of the dollops.

Serve right away or cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.

This recipe serves 12-16 people.  

You can also layer this trifle into individual cups like these banana split parfait cups.

Rainbow Trifle Recipe Notes and FAQ

Colored cookie alternative.

If you want to skip coloring the wafer cookies, you can use any kind of crunchy cookie. Choose a rainbow cookie if you want the added color, or any kind of crunchy vanilla cookie will be good. It’s good to have the crunch, so choose a harder cookie if you can.

The order of the layers.

Here’s the order of the layers once again to be clear: Purple cake, pudding, cookies, blue cake, whipped cream, green cake, pudding, cookies, yellow cake, whipped cream, pink cake, topping.

Do I have to use a trifle bowl?

No, using a trifle bowl for this recipe is optional, but great for appearance. You can also make mini trifles by layering the ingredients into individual glasses. If you don’t care how it looks, layer the ingredients into any kind of bowl you want!

Rainbow Desserts

• Rainbow fruit popsicles with fresh fruit and juice.
• Rainbow crispy pinwheels for a unique twist on crispy rice treats.
• Beautiful Rainbow unicorn poke cake.
• Quick and easy Rainbow unicorn fudge.
• Rainbow popcorn to use as a snack mix or serve in a rainbow.
• Crispy Rainbow bark candy that’s fun to make with the kids.

Want desserts delivered instead? Read my review of Crumbs Bakeshop cupcakes and cookies!

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Let me know if you make this rainbow trifle. I’d love to hear how it turned out!