I have a really dirty, shameful secret, and I guess I have to share it, in order to post this recipe. Augh! You guys know I’m the Evil Cake Overlord, and purveyor of all that is awesome about cake. You know that I swear by Swiss Meringue Buttercream, which is – quite simply – the most fabulous frosting that ever existed. I have never steered anyone wrong when it comes to matters of cake. Here’s the thing: That “frosting” you buy in a can? Like… the “cream cheese” stuff? The stuff I would never personally put on a cake… ever? I love it. I have the most ridiculous sweet tooth ever, one that knows NO shame. While I would never use canned frosting on cake, it has other great uses… like making store bought gluten free cookies palatable. Melting some and drizzling it over ice cream is probably my guiltiest of pleasures. (Hear that? That’s the sound of my “cred” dying… ack! ). With the new cake vodkas on the market, there’s another great use for it – I like to keep some on hand, for rimming martini glasses!

… which brings me to today’s recipe: Birthday Cake Martinis!

As I described in my Candy Apple Martinis post, today’s recipe is technically a martini cocktail, not a “martini”. It’s all good. Anyway, last year, I made a Dessert Pizza for my husband’s birthday. This year, I created this cocktail for him.

…And then I procrastinated for almost two months, only getting around to posting it when my own birthday was looming! I’m turning 33 tomorrow, hubby – as always – beat me to it!

Anyway, it’s been about a year since we first saw the UV “Cake” flavored vodka in a liquor store, which we had to buy – obviously. I don’t know what we were expecting, but we were kind of shocked when out mouths were greeted with the very clear, VERY accurate flavor of canned frosting.

Looking for less whimsy, and more elegance? Skip the frosting and nonpareils, and go straight to the edible glitter rim!

Birthday Cake Martinis

Canned frosting (We used “cream cheese” flavor)
Nonpariels, sprinkles, or colored sugar

2 oz UV Cake Vodka
1 oz Disarrono Amaretto
1 oz Godiva White Chocolate Creme Liqueur
3 oz coconut cream*

Using a clean fingertip, smear a thin ring of frosting around the edge of an 8oz martini glass. Pour some nonpareils into a shallow dish, gently roll frosted glass edge in them, to coat.

Measure remaining ingredients into a shaker. Add a handful of ice, shake a few times, strain into a martini cocktail glass** (~8 oz size).

* “Coconut Cream” is the heavy, creamy version of coconut milk. We tend to buy it in Asian grocers, but it’s usually available in the Asian/Indian sections of larger grocers also. It’s NOT “Coconut Juice” or “Cream of Coconut” – those are two entirely different products!

** For the purposes of this blog entry, we used appropriately shaped/sized glasses from IKEA – about $3 each

This trio of awesome Star Wars cakes courtesy of Jen at Sweet Element Cakes, who is also on Twitter at @SweetElement

Interesting note: The molecule Jen uses in her logo is Theobromine, which she chose due to the amount of chocolate she uses! She considers herself a “moderate” geek (Yeah, right…”moderate” – with a logo like that!), but is surrounded by geeks, and married one!

AT-AT Groom’s Cake

Darth Vader & Obi-Wan Kenobi Fight Scene Groom’s Cake

Surprise Guinness & Lego Stormtroopers & Darth Vader Groom’s Cake

I have a friend, Todd, who is well known locally as “The Predator”. No, not for anything gross, but for his costuming prowess. He routinely dresses up as The Predator for Conventions and special events, and looks great!

In fact, I was gonna bring him as my date to an event, in costume. Received an event invite from a local business person who’d badmouthed me and my business, and it got back to me. Yes, the one who said I was throwing it all “down the toilet” by cavorting with Klingons. Whatever. She’d made the mistake of referring to “creative fashion appreciated” on the invite for her chi-chi “NYC style” event, so I figured “The Predator” woulda been fun. In the end, A.) I figured she was probably baiting me, and B.) I’m not fond of spending much time with wannabes and pretentious fake people, so I didn’t go. I can get by on the mental images of what coulda been, though!

Yes, it could have been delicious, but I digress. Todd hosted a room party at a local horror movie convention this weekend, so we planned to do a small cake for the event. I think I’ll let the photos do the talking for me

Seriously, how badass is that costume?

We had a great time hanging out, chatting, and trying to convince Todd to take up pole dancing in that getup. Seriously, it would be epic! His guests loved the cake, and it was fun to see all the double-takes that happened when “the cake” was mentioned. One person walked right by it, looked at it, kept looking around and asked us where the cake was! Awesome.

One final pic, as it’s something we get asked about a lot:

This is what the interior of our cakes look like – all edible! Due to the popularity of cake shows on TV, a lot of people are under the assumption that carved/crazy cakes are all done in stryrofoam and other inedible materials. Not so! we are proud to have our cakes be made from real, delicious ingredients!

Aside from the main body of the cake, the dreadlocks were made from fondant covered Twizzlers, and there was a small amount of Rice Krispie treat supporting the back of the dreadlocks from underneath. All tasty!

This cake was made for one of my geeky tweeps. Her husband and her have had a running joke about a “Ganache Ganesh” for years. (Ganache being the thick chocolate filling that truffles are made from). She jumped at the chance to make their in-joke a reality, and planned to present him with a birthday cake of epic proportions. I am pleased to present “The Ganache Ganesh”!

This cake is entirely edible, aside from a couple dowels/wires in the extremities. The base and most of Ganesh’s body is made from our B-52 flavor cake:

“Not only delicious, this cake is a visual delight when sliced! Alternating layers of blood orange and mocha cake are filled with alternating layers of Irish Cream Mousse and Blood Orange chocolate truffle ganache!”

Awesome.

The rest of the cake is sculpted from Rice Krispies.

Watching the comments come in on Twitter and facebook has been great! A few of my favs:

“Wow, I had to convince my husband that was a cake.”

“That is possibly the coolest cake EVAR, and then the name makes it even better. More pics please!”

” “Look at your man. Now look at me. Is your man covered in fondant?” need an occasion to get @Celebr8nGenr8n to make that one. “

” That is amazing! The secret ingredient is obviously insane amounts of awesome. Well done.”

” I love your cakes. Love and hate..cuz they’re gorgeous…but then it makes me crave your delicious cake.”

Thank you kindly, everyone! It was a lot of work, but the pics and reactions make it SO worth it!

As you may know, I’ve been on a writing sabbatical for the past while. It’s been interesting to spend SO much time *out* of my commercial kitchen – either in my home office, banging out my upcoming cookbook… or in my own, home kitchen, working on recipes for the book.

The time hasn’t been completely cake-less.. the Hannibal cake broke up the writing mojo for a bit… and then a friend celebrated a birthday. Such a crazy, unique individual, couldn’t resist crafting something that suited her. I’ll post more write up later, but a bit of background: Melissa – AKA “Queen of the Lizard People” – is an avid photographer. Recently, she’s taken on a few long term projects, photographing fortune cookie papers, and conversation hearts (separately!)

The cake was entirely edible – The camera & lizard bodies were carved from fresh lemon cake (which was brushed with a fresh lemon syrup, and filled with our tangy fresh lemon swiss meringue buttercream! – she wanted “in-your-face” lemon flavor!), with the camera lens and lizard head sculpted from Rice Krispie Treat. The black fondant was chocolate, the orange fondant was lemon flavored. Yum! Additionally, the “conversation hearts” were made from fondant, and the crown / fortunes were made from gum paste.

Check out the photos!

As always, the cake is entirely edible – the only non-cake portion is the “lens”, which was fashioned out of Rice Krispie Treat!

A carved birthday cake for a reality tv star! Shawn Bakken (of Beauty & the Geek fame) is a soccer playing Scout leader.