Unless they've got Julie from Masterchef as a mum, there's a good chance kids these days aren't getting the home made cake for their birthdays any more.
Today, it's far too easy to order a store bought cake. In fact, most shops allow you to place an order online. You can browse a catalogue of images or select colours and flavours from a drop down menu and just pick up the cake on the day, customised message and all.
So what are the high flyers in the cake realm?
The chocolate mud is an all time favourite. I personally recommend the decadent and rich offering from Cuisine Pattiserie located at 475 Old South Head Road, Rose Bay. If that's not your thing though, they do a fantastic Bon Vivant, a wheat free cake consisting of two layers; the first a soft flourless hazelnut cake, the top a smooth baked chocolate mousse.
Michel's is also popular for their choc mud. Not as rich as Cuisine's (so you can have two pieces), Michel's offers a white chocolate mud, marble mud (white and milk mixed) and a caramel mud if you feel like a variation on a classic.
Ice cream cake is always a winner, especially amongst younger kids. However they've come a long way from the Neapolitan ice cream cakes with chewy stuck on images that I was serving at my birthday parties in the 90s.
Coldrock offers various sized cakes. You choose the flavours of your icecreams for each layer, how many and which mix ins (including lollies, chocolates, and fruit) go in each layer and what image or message you'd like on the top, or you can pick one of their modern designs. This is the Designer Birthday Cake. You're customising your cake to every last detail, ensuring no one's cake is the same as yours.
Frozen treats have moved through stages of popularity; starting with ice cream, progressing to gelato and the newest trend is frozen yoghurt.
Following this, Pure Gelato took the original scoop of icecream concept and developed this into an impressive looking
Gelato birthday cake. Though on the pricey side, the cakes serve a large number of people and whatever is left over can be kept for extensive periods of time in the freezer and becomes dessert for the following weeks. The drawback to the frozen cakes however is the storage prior to the party. If your celebration is at home there's no problem but if you've hired a venue you must ensure they have ample freezer space.
Completing the frozen trail is the
Frozen Yoghurt Cake. So far I've only seen this offered by Twisted at Bondi Beach, but with the string of Froyo places increasingly popping up, including Smooch, Igloo Zoo and Wow Cow, I'm sure there will be a few more offerings in the near future.
Now you've got a tough decision to make. What cake will you be having at your next birthday?
