The Holly Hobbie Birthday Cake of Every Grown Man's Dreams

For a while I’ve been thinking that I need a go-to birthday cake recipe. The kind of recipe that you can count on to yield a perfect two-layer cake that you can fill and frost. You know the kind of cake I am talking about.

Note: roses do not occur in this color in nature.

With my husband’s birthday right around the corner, I figured it was time to begin my quest. I asked him what kind of birthday cake he wanted and he surprised me by replying, “I want the Holly Hobbie cake.” 

I should probably give a little Holly Hobbie cake background. This is the same cake that my mom made for my sixth (or fifth?) birthday party. It was a lot of work to decorate and so my mom has a bit of a love/hate memory of the experience. She is proud and remembers that it turned out really cute, but she also recalls that was over three hours of her life she can’t get back.

Naturally, I was up for the Holly Hobbie cake challenge. When I told Jenny about the plan, her immediate response was, “I’m in!” I bought a used 1975 Wilton Holly Hobbie pan and found the decorating instruction sheet online, and then started thinking about which cake recipe to bake. The Wilton instructions were useless in this department, as their helpful hint is to follow the instructions on the box. WTF, Wilton! Box cake? Maybe they recommend box cakes because they are guaranteed to bake up perfectly, and they know the home baker will be challenged to bake a proper cake in their shite character-shaped pans that are so thin you can nearly see through them. In the end, I chose this lemon cake recipe without the lemon filling: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/lemon-layer-cake-recipe/index.html.

The crumb and taste of the cake was excellent although the center of the cake didn’t rise up evenly. I’d like to blame the thin pan and my weird oven. Maybe I will. Luckily, it doesn’t matter because you have to turn the cake over to frost the bejesus out of it. We used a basic butter cream flavored with lemon.

The better-looking side

Finished! Now I need an arm massage.

Jenny and I followed the decorating instructions and piped our hearts out.  When I finally got the finishing touches completed, the end result was pretty good. (If I do say so myself!) Most importantly, my husband loved it and it tasted great. Also, I guess I have to give props to my mom for making this cake while she had two kids running around the house.

Looks like my next birthday cake will have to be one of those two-layer jobbies. 

- Jenn