My Birthday Cake!

Never in my life had I celebrated my birthday outside. November is usually pretty cold around here and it’s much more likely for us to gather around the fireplace than having lunch under the porch. Yet, that’s what we did. It was a gorgeous day.

…So I’m one year older and I like to think I’m a bit wiser than last year. Unfortunately, certain bad habits seem to stick with me – i.e. driving myself insane by choosing to undertake complicated tasks. Making an elaborate layer cake for my birthday is definitely one of them.

Since I didn’t have much experience at baking and decorating these types of cakes (and I wasn’t cautious enough to test one in advance), I was afraid something could go REALLY wrong with it. Oh Gosh, I was so afraid to end up with a “leaning tower of Lisa” covered with some unidentified white slush full of crumbs and covered with a lumpy mass of chocolate. Thankfully, this wasn’t the case. My birthday cake was pretty, rustic-looking, and VERY yummy!

Here’s a description of what it’s made of. (:

Name // torta di compleanno di Lisa
Base // 4 layers of molly cake*
Filling // wild strawberry jam
Frosting // vanilla cream cheese
Glaze // dark chocolate
Toppings // sugared crabapples from my garden & crushed amaretti cookies

As you can see, I was able to take just a couple of photos…Next time I’ll definitely have to remember to delegate the cake cutting and serving, so my hands will be free to better document my hard work.

….taaaantiiiiii auguuuuuriiii aaaaa meeeee!!!

*”Molly cake” is a cake recipe created by Eleonora Coppini, a popular Italian cake designer.