Dillon's Birthday Cake

For his 17th birthday, he wanted an ice-cream cake with Phish Food ice-cream and chocolate cake. With the help of WinnCo pricing, we added our own labor to produce the tall ice-cream cake for about $25, and had fun doing it.

First, bake up a Double Fudge cake mix in two nine-inch round pans. Cool completely on wire racks. Then carefully cut off the lopsided tops of both cakes. We wrapped them up and put both cakes and also the two cut-off tops in the freezer.

Meanwhile, wash and dry the cake pans, line with an oversized piece of wax paper, and fill each one with a carton of Breyer's All Natural chocolate ice-cream. Cover with more wax paper and freeze over night. I had a nine-inch springform pan, which I used exactly as above, filling with four pints of Ben & Jerry's Phish Food. Parts of the Phish Food layer will just never freeze as hard, because of the marshmellow and caramel.

To assemble: Get a large plate or platter ready, take out all the cake and ice-cream parts from the freezer and quickly remove the wax paper and wrapping. Layer cake, chocolate ice-cream, cake, Phish Food, the two tops from the cake, more chocolate ice-cream on the plate in a tall stack. Return to the freezer.

For the frosting: Soak 2 teaspoons gelatin in one third cup of water. Heat over boiling water just until dissolved. Cool. Whip 3 cups whipping cream until it starts to thicken. Add 1 teaspoon vanilla, about a cup of powdered sugar, and while beating, slowly pour in the cooled gelatin mixture. Chill in the refigerator for half an hour, then whip again until peaks form. Remove the frozen cake from the freezer and frost with the stabilized whipped cream. Return to freezer. When it is all frozen, remove again and decorate by pushing m&m candies into the frozen whipped cream. Return to freezer until ready to serve.

We were afraid to let it sit out of the freezer for too long, in case of a landslide type disaster, so this cake was extrememly hard to cut. But it was a spectacularly large and yummy cake, once Bill wrestled you a slice!