Eclair Cake Recipe

Jim's birthday was last week! He's always felt like his birthday is a Christmas after-thought and even after 43 years he can still be a little bitter, um..I mean, sensitive about it! I get it though. My birthday is in August and so I never had to compete with any holidays for attention but I can only imagine how it must feel to have your special day so close to the biggest special day of the year. Wah-wahhhh.

When we got married I decided to put effort into his day and to make it as festive and special as possible. This usually means I make him some kind of birthday cake that I know he would really enjoy. One year I made him a red velvet cake from scratch and, well, let's just say I am still finding red food coloring in my kitchen.

This year I went with an eclair cake. My man loves Boston Cream Pie so I thought this icebox version would be perfect! Easy but still fun.

I used regular graham crackers and an almost homemade pastry cream for the layers. Then I topped it off with a delicious and decadent chocolate frosting.

Ice box cakes are pretty self-explanatory. Crackers, pudding, crackers, pudding, crackers, pudding, and so on and so forth. My pudding/pastry cream was luscious and fluffy and stupid easy to make.

Combine 1 box of french vanilla instant pudding with 3/4 c. milk, 1 pint whipping cream, 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, and 1-2 tablespoons sugar. Then just whip it until it is thick and fluffy. It made enough for an 8x8 inch size cake with three layers.

The chocolate frosting layer is a recipe from Chef in Training. If you haven't visited her site, I hope you will. This blog is my go to blog for recipes!

Next time I will half the chocolate frosting. We all felt like it was a bit rich and made too thick of a layer for our liking. But the flavor is spot on.

A good icebox cake needs to be chilled for as long as possible and I find they are always best the next day. The graham crackers need to be soft and cake-like for it to be truly perfect.

Try this cake..I promise you won't be disappointed!

Cheers!

Jenny

4 comments:

NickycarpJanuary 12, 2015 at 8:14 AM
Um, speak for yourself on the chocolate layer! I thought it was perfect!!!!!! I would not change a thing!!!!
AnonymousJanuary 12, 2015 at 10:33 AM
Boy, do I know how he feels. My birthday is also close to Christmas and growing up I always had the question: Do you want to open this present for Christmas or your birthday? Awful thing for a kid to hear especially since none of my siblings ever had to answer it. I made my husband promise that even if it was only a token gift for my birthday that he never combine the two. His birthmother's birthday was Christmas Day but her husband and kids always made a point of Christmas morning being Christmas and Christmas afternoon was always her birthday time with birthday cards, birthday cake and birthday wrapping paper!!!
VanessaJanuary 19, 2015 at 5:26 PM
Oh, mind this looks amazing. Pinning.
Juniper HillJanuary 19, 2015 at 5:43 PM
Ahh...looks DeLiSHiOuS! Chocolate can NEVER be too rich or thick! Oh it looks so yummy!

Thanks for your comments!

Days of Chalk and Chocolate