Garden Cake

My sweet niece turned 4 not too long ago, and I got to make her birthday cake for the third year in a row. This year it was finally something other than a Dora cake. Not that I didn't like Dora, but it was fun to do something different. She had a garden party, so naturally I made a garden cake.

I wish I had a real garden like this. I'd just love to walk down that charming little path and smell the flowers and pick all the veggies.

The kiddies helped me make all the veggies and leaves. They're naturals.

Eden especially loved helping me. She takes after her auntie in more than just her looks.

Aren't all those vegetables just adorable? I think this may be my favorite cake I've ever made.

See Ma, I did inherit your green thumb after all. Ok, so maybe it's just the food coloring.

My favorite part of the cake is the curly-cue pumpkin vine. I might make a whole pumpkin patch cake one day.

You may have noticed that this is a very different kind of cake post than usual. There is a serious lack of disasters and funny stories. That's because for the first time it went off without a hitch. Of course that's probably because I didn't have to actually make a cake. And moe importantly, there was no frosting to be heard of. Nothing but fondant. I can do fondant. Allow me to introduce you to the best food on the planet earth:

Grandma's Ice Cream Cake

Ingredients:

2 packages Oreo cookies*, crushed

1 stick butter, melted

1 quart vanilla ice cream*, softened

Method:

1. Mix butter with half of the Oreo crumbs.

3. Press into the bottom of a 9 x 13 pan.

3. Spread ice cream over crust.

4. Sprinkle the rest of the Oreo crumbs on top.

5. Freeze. Move cake from freezer to refrigerator 20-30 minutes before serving so it will be soft enough to cut and serve.

I'm pretty sure my grandma actually only uses 1 package of oreos. But I prefer a thicker crust. And you need to make sure you have a few extra cookies to munch on.

*This could easily be done with all different kinds of Oreos and ice cream. I've done it with vanilla Oreos for non-chocolate lovers (how such a person exists is beyond me) and chocolate cream Oreos with chocolate ice cream for chocoholics (surprisingly not as good as I expected, but I think that was because of the quality of the ice cream). There's mint Oreos and berry Oreos and Uh Oh Oreos. If two packages of oreos still isn't enough for you, you can use cookies and cream ice cream. I'm dying to try peanut butter Oreos with Chocolate Moose Tracks ice cream. Overkill? I think not!