Red, White & Blue Jello Cake

This is a favorite of mine, because it’s a prepare-ahead dish, which is important when you have a lot of food to make for a crowd — and you serve it right in the baking dish. Even though this is the simplest of ingredients, everyone really loves the finished dessert. The refrigerated cake is ice cold, and makes a nice finish for a heavy meal, such as the 4^thof July.

Although I love to make fresh whipped cream for certain things, this is not one of them. It calls for using Cool Whip, and I think it’s the nostalgia of these simple ingredients that makes this so good.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 White cake mix
• 1 box of blue-colored Jello – your choice of flavor
• 1 box of red-colored Jello – your choice of flavor
• 1 container of frozen whipped topping (such as Cool Whip), thawed in the refrigerator
• Cooking spray

METHOD:

Preheat oven, and prepare a 9×13 baking dish with cooking spray.

Prepare cake mix and bake in the 9×13 pan, according to package directions. Allow the cooked cake to cool right in the pan, then poke holes all over the top of the cake, using a skewer, toothpick or fork. Poke a lot of holes – about 1/2 inch apart – all over the top of the cake.

Mix each Jello mixture with 1.5 cups of boiling water each (do not add the cold water), and pour slowly over top of the cake, so that the mixture runs down into the holes. Use the “regular” size box of Jello (not the double box). This year, I could only get the blue Jello in the larger box, so I only used part of the box. Try to keep the colors separate as you drizzle, so that you get a nice  mix of red and blue in each slice of white cake. You will get an overall purple cake if you run the colors together.

Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 4 hours (or overnight). Finish with the entire container of Cool Whip over the top before serving.