(190/366)
This is the birthday cake that Andrew made for himself. And apparently when he’s going to make himself a cake, he goes all out.
It’s chocolate cake, with layers of icing, graham crackers, and ice cream. Now that sounds pretty good in itself, but once you find out that the ENTIRE thing is made from scratch, it becomes all that more impressive. This is the guy who hates baking. Or rather, he hates making anything in the oven. I can think of one particularly nasty quiche experience that pretty much assures me that Andrew won’t be making quiche anytime in the near or distant future.
He made the chocolate cake from scratch. Like me, he discovered that I have never posted a recipe for chocolate cake on this website. After spending far too long searching for one, he used a recipe off the internet. It came out quite well if I do say so myself. It’s a nice fluffy and moist cake that was delicious, but wouldn’t be great for carving.
The icing is a buttercream icing that he also made from scratch. Andrew has embraced the stand mixer and went with a full butter icing. The guy doesn’t skimp.
But the most impressive and delicious part is the ice cream. I’m a fan of the cream and milk, no cooking based ice creams, mostly because I get a bit lazy. But he went all-in with the custard style ice cream made by cooking up an ice cream base with egg yolks. The ice cream is vanilla bean and he used a whole vanilla bean, not just some extract. I think Andrew is the expert ice cream maker in this house.
He’s also set a precedent, which means I will be expecting elaborate cakes for my birthday in the future. Andrew, you’ve been warned.