Cakes of Birthdays Past

Growing up, my family had a go-to cake for every birthday celebration...Sweet Secret's fruit charlotte cake. It wasn't that it was the most fabulous cake but it was just tradition, we always got it (Had I had my way, we would have gotten a chocolate cake of some sort, but poor papa T is allergic to caffeine so we had to compromise). Till today, I can still recall the light sponge cake and sweet sweet fruits that topped the cake. The fruit charlotte cake was the cake of my childhood.

When I moved to America in my teens, my mother and I were dismayed at the horrible artificially sweetened cakes one found at the grocery store. Every year, we tried to find a decent cake to replace the fruit charlotte cake but alas, it was a fruitless pursuit (pun intended). So for a few years in high school, I never got a decent cake for my birthday.

Ice Cream Cake courtesy of awesome college friends

The birthday cake situation started to improve in my college years. Some highlights included an ice cream cake for my 21st and in recent years, my lovely and very talented sister-in-law Sarah has always made me a homemade birthday cake for my birthday. We've had Black Forest cake one year, a cheese cake for another and German chocolate cake another.

Black Forest Cake being cut by the beautiful Sarah

This year, Sarah outdid herself again with the most decadent and rich chocolate tort cake. Made without flour, this tort was dense, moist, bitter (in a good way) and very chocolaty. Even my brother, who is not a chocolate guy, gave it two thumbs up. Served with vanilla ice cream and fresh strawberries, we all had second helpings that day. Mmmmmm...

Drool.

To read more about my belated birthday weekend with my family, and to see my new hair cut (which mama T dislikes! *sob*) click on over to Sarah's blog.