Birthday Cake

I'm sad to report that the cookies and cream cheesecake cups have been postponed. More important matters were brought to my attention. This past Saturday was Chris' mom (Jill)'s birthday. Clearly this required cake. The solution, the ultimate lemon cake. The cake was devoured before I got to take a picture, I'll check with Chris' family to see if they took one and I'll post it if they do. Let me tell you a big more about what an ultimate lemon cake is: white cake split into 4 layers with lemon curd between each layer, frosted with a lemony white chocolate cream cheese frosting and decorated with white chocolate shavings. I mean come on! White chocolate, lemon and cream cheese! What more does one need? It may be one of the easiest cakes I've ever made as well! Alright here we go, believe it or not, I started out with a box white cake mix. I don't believe in box cakes but this made things so much simpler and I dare say you couldn't taste the difference. If you had it and are reading this, did you know? Exactly! Okay with the mix use the recipe that only uses egg whites. This makes the cake so much lighter and even a smidge healthier! Prepare the cakes as normal and bake as directed in 2 9in. round cake pans. Once they have cooled completely cut each round in half creating 4 layers. Stack the cake putting a layer of store bought (I suppose you could make your own) lemon curd. I get mine at Trader Joe's, it's fantastic. I ended up using nearly 2 jars of lemon curd in this cake. Use as much or little as you would like. I'm a lemon freak so I went pretty heavy on the curd. The only real recipe I used was the one for the frosting:

Lemony White Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting
6 ounces white chocolate, coarsely chopped
1 package (8 ounces)cream cheese, at room temperature
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) butter, at room temperature
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
3 cups confectioners' sugar, sifted
1. Place the white chocolate in a small glass bowl in the microwave oven on high power for 1 minute. Remove the bowl from the oven and stir with a wooden spoon or a rubber spatula until it is smooth. Set the chocolate aside to cool.
2. Place the cream cheese and butter in a large mixing bowl. Beat with an electric mixer on low speed until well combined, 30 seconds. Stop the machine. Add the lemon juice, lemon zest, and melted white chocolate, and blend on low speed until just combined, 30 seconds. Add the confectioners' sugar and blend on low speed until the sugar is incorporated, 30 seconds. Increase the mixer speed to medium and beat until the frosting is fluffy, 1 minute or more.

Topping the cake only used about 3/4 of the frosting. With the remaining frosting I added some pink food coloring and piped around the top edge and base of the cake to make it look a little more fancy and girly. I then shaved some white chocolate onto the top of the cake. I also added some pink food coloring to some melted white chocolate and piped "Happy Birthday Jill!" onto a piece of wax paper and put it in the freezer. I just peeled off the wax paper and set the chocolate writing on top of the cake. This was a million times easier than trying to write with frosting. If I messed up writing I could just start over and I could evenly place it on the cake without messing up everything. I would definitely recommend this if you aren't confident in your frosting writing skills! You have to try this cake!!!