Ben’s birthday was this weekend and I had grand plans for his cake this year, based on a pin of mine over on pinterest. But then somewhere around Tuesday, I sort of hit the wall for the week.  Which is the equivalent of realizing you’re ready for bed at 10:30 am on a day where you just don’t have the time to go to bed until about 11 that night. You know those days?  Well, that was my week.    Two solid months of being booked solid caught up with me in a huge way.  There wasn’t much I could really back out of, I just had to put on my big girl pants and get through it.  And that’s when I was inspired to reconsider Ben’s cake.  I knew I would be hard pressed to whip up a layer cake with fillings and frosting, but why couldn’t I take one of my fabulous flourless tortes and use that as a base for Ben’s requested  ‘chocolate, chocolate, chocolate’ cake?  Which is what I did.

The original idea was a layer cake, sides covered in chocolate chips and chopped up candy bars on top.  I managed to have just enough chocolate buttercream frosting left over from Cyane’s cupcakes I’d made earlier in the week to do a skimcoat on the torte to give the chocolate chips and candy bars something to stick to.   The cake still needed a little something to pull it together appearance wise, so I melted another dark chocolate bar and drizzled it on top.

It was absolutely decadent.  And one of the easiest cakes I’ve ever gotten credit for.  Edie had Cousin Emily sleep over this weekend and while Edie was showering after their soccer game Saturday, Emily wanted to help me with the cake.  She was such an enthusiastic helper, that really, she made the cake, I just supervised.  That’s how super easy this particular flourless chocolate cake is – an 11 year old girl can do it.  All I had to do was decorate the cake.

This particular cake recipe yields a dense, fudgy cake.   It’s like a rich, gooey brownie.   Then top it off with your favorite candy bars (in this case, it was Ben’s favorite, Snickers) and even more chocolate and voila.   Whipped cream or jam could be used to adhere the exterior chocolate – I used about a quarter cup of buttercream. You don’t need much really, so feel free to improvise with what you have on hand.  I stuck the whole thing in the fridge for  a few hours for all the chocolate to harden before serving.

I call it Candy Bar Chocolate Birthday Cake.   If you like chocolate, this is for you.  I suspect it is about to be entered into the Neighborhood Birthday Cake Hall of Fame, based on comments made at last night’s celebration.  And it really could not be easier to do.