April = Month of Cake

April is a busy month for birthdays around here.  My mom and myself are in April, while my brother’s birthday was in April, too.  Over the Christmas break my mom and I were sitting on the couch and she decided to start a conversation by saying, “Next year you will be 30..” and I quickly followed up with ‘and I’ve never been to Disney World!”

So, we went to Disney World.  In February. I ended my then current job at the beginning of February, went to Disney, took some extra time off, and just before the month ended I started my new job. Honestly, it was such a fun and well needed trip for the two of us.  I’ve never been, and wouldn’t settle to go with anyone but my mom for the first time, and she hasn’t been since she was 18 (that was only for a day!).

Then we decided that we’ll make one another’s birthday cake!  My mom said she wanted a yellow cake with white fluffy icing… so I had to work with that request.  Any time there’s an option for something s’mores or chocolate and peanut butter she’s all over it.  So, I went to work with make her yellow cake and white fluffy icing:

For the yellow cake I used Smitten Kitchen’s recipe for the best birthday cake. I made 2 layers with a 9 in. pan and it overflowed. I was prepared for that possibly happening.  Once the layers cooled I leveled them and the leftover cake was good to nibble on 🙂  For the fluffy white icing I made marshmallow icing.

On top of the first layer of cake I had made a thick fudgy icing, made a graham cracker crumble (broken up pieces dribbled with melted butter and sugar, then put in the oven for about 10 minutes), and then I had put a layer of peanut butter icing over the graham cracker crumble.  I improvised these icings since I only need such a small batch. I should have used more butter and cream for them because the cake separated a little at the middle with the graham crumble.  So, you’d have a plate with a layer of yellow cake and fudge and graham cracker and then yellow cake covered in marshmallow icing with peanut butter and graham crumble.

Too bad I forgot to take a picture!

My cake was something else… ohmigosh, it was rich and took nearly 2 hours to eat a slice!  I said how about a chocolate cake with coconut icing?

Being that my mom knew I’m a Smitten Kitchen fan, she made this recipe. The ganache was soooooooooooooooooooooooooo good.  She used that between the layers and melted it over top the coconut icing.

The icing recipe was for a bundt cake, but this layered cake was generously iced and still had some left over… I can’t imagine how much icing would have been on this bundt cake!!  There was one issue that my mom ran into with the cake: again, 9 in. pans and the batter would rise and then fall.  She’s not normally one for measuring, but she measured everything accurately.  I didn’t find anything in the comments about this, so who knows what happened!

Either way, the cake was fudgy and moist and absolutely delicious:

welp, that’s what I’ve been up to… celebrating birthdays and stuffing myself with cake for breakfast everyday 😀

Happy Birthday to the other April babies!!