Cake.

I wish I had a lot of good stuff to say about Eric's birthday this year. I don't. It was kind of miserable all around. We had to have a part replaced on the car we are trying to sell in order for it to pass inspection, so I spent the day running (literally) back and forth between the mechanic and the hospital parking garage and the Y and our house. It was no fun.

 Eric had to work late and was crazy busy all day and forgot it was even his birthday. And the people coming to look at our car showed up an hour early - when I was on my way to pick up Eric from work since I took his car - and he ended up walking home from work. I felt horrible. And they didn't even buy the car.

So at almost 8 pm we decided to "celebrate" with Five Guys and cake - the one birthday thing I successfully accomplished.

Okay, the pictures aren't great, and this cake wasn't beautiful. But I was really proud of it and it tasted really good!! I got the inspiration for it from a pin I found on Pinterest for a "vintage cake" - a white cake with a brownie bottom. Eric's more of a chocolate cake fan, and the actual cake recipe on the site didn't sound like something I really wanted to make/eat. But I went with the general idea of a brownie-bottom with white icing, and I think it turned out really well!

Layer #1 - Brownie. I used a packaged mix for this because it was available, but think I'll try homemade next time. It's kind of hard to make brownies keep a perfectly round shape like cakes, so I ended up kind of molding the brownie into the shape I wanted with my (clean) hands. With the other layers on top, you totally couldn't tell, and it still tasted delish.

Layer #2 - Chocolate sauce. There are a few different ways to go about this. I made sauce using maple syrup and cocoa, and thought it was amazing. You can also do sweetened condensed milk and cocoa, or, of course, just buy some chocolate sauce.

Layer #3 - Chocolate cake from scratch. Here's the recipe I (approximately) followed. It's the second time I've made it and it is fab-u-lous.

- 1 3/4 c. flour
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
- 3/4 c. cocoa powder
- 2 c. sugar
- 1/2 c. butter
- 1/4 c. oil
- 1 c. hot coffee
- 1 c. buttermilk (I put 1 tsp. vinegar in a cup of milk and let it sit - very similar flavor!)
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp. vanilla

Mix together all the dry ingredients except the sugar. Combine butter, oil, sugar, eggs and vanilla. Add in dry ingredients. Slowly mix in buttermilk and coffee. Batter will be extremely runny. Bake in a greased round pan at 350 degrees for 35-40 minutes. 

Layer #4 - Vanilla icing. I may try this from scratch next time too, but I was pretty crunched for time and had a baby involved here, so I just used my favorite Betty Crocker icing. Honestly, it doesn't get much better than that.

Layer #5 - White cake from scratch. I was a little worried about this part and actually bought a box mix as back up, but this is the first white cake recipe I found that I really really enjoyed. It will definitely be making an appearance again!

- 5 egg whites
- 3/4 c. whole milk
- 2 tsp. vanilla
- 2 1/2 c. cake flour
- 1 3/4 c. sugar
- 4 tsp. baking powder
- 1 tsp. salt
- 3/4 c. butter, room temperature

Combine dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, combine egg whites, milk and vanilla. Slow stir in dry ingredients. Add in butter. Pour into a greased pan and bake at 350 for 20-30 minutes. 

Layer # 6 - A healthy dose of vanilla icing over it all! I should have bought an extra can of icing. One just wasn't quite enough to cover two thick cakes and a brownie layer (not to mention the icing between the cakes). The lack of icing made it look not-so-pretty. But trust me, it tasted beautiful.


And while I'm on the subject of cakes, I also made my first diaper cake this week. It wasn't amazing or anything, but I thought it turned out okay considering I had NO clue what I was doing!

Domestic goddess?? Perhaps (NOT!). ;-)