I made two chocolate chocolate birthday cakes last week

A long, long time ago, in a land (I'm not sure how) far away, a boy was born.  A cute little ginger boy.

And Tuesday was his 44th birthday.

Happy Birthday honey!

When I asked Jeff what kind of birthday cake he wanted, he said that he wanted chocolate with chocolate "but nothing fancy."  Um, does that meant that last year's cake was too fancy?  I mean, all I did was crunch up Oreos, put them in chocolate pudding, and use it as the filling...  which kept the cake very moist, I might add!  He loves his chocolate cake to be moist...

Okay, so chocolate with chocolate.  And then I though, "I'll make homemade frosting!"  Colleen suggested butter frosting, so I found a recipe on Apple Crumbles (via Pinterest, of course) that looked good.

Jeff also likes his cakes to be super-duper moist, so instead of oil, I used heavy cream in the mix (yes, I used boxed cake mix).  Using my hand mixer, first I mixed up the eggs really well, then added the cream (the amount that it called for oil), and then I mixed that up really well also.  Like, on the way to making whipped cream. Um, I might have substituted some cream for some of the water it called for too.   Yep.  While the cake cooled, I made frosting.

Fluffy Chocolate Butter Frosting

Makes about 1 3/4 cups to 2 cups

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 3 oz. unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled
• 2 1/2 cups un-sifted confectioners sugar
• 4 TBS hot water
• 1 tsp. water

In a small bowl, blend the butter and chocolate with an electric mixer.  Gradually beat in the sugar alternating with the warm water.  Place the bowl in a larger bowl of ice water and beat until fluffy. Beat in the vanilla.

Huh, I just realized that I didn't add in vanilla, because it wasn't in the ingredients list...  So, if you're going to make that, maybe put in a little bit of vanilla, for depth or something.  Also, I'm thinking it would have been yummier if I had just used some Nutella instead of melting chocolate.

I didn't think it would make enough frosting, so I doubled everything except the chocolate (and believe me, it was chocolaty enough...).  Rhyanne and I tried it, liked it, so I frosted the cake.

I frosted the cake without Jeff trying the frosting first.  

That was a mistake.

After the cake was frosted, Jeff tried the frosting and said "I guess it will do."  And he wasn't joking.  He didn't like it.  I got upset that I had made this cake with home-freaking-made frosting, and he didn't like it?!?!?

That was Monday.

Tuesday morning, after wishing Jeff a happy birthday and heading to work, I realized that it was my mistake, not his fault.  He said "but nothing fancy" and I didn't listen to him.  I didn't listen to Jeff about what he wanted for his own birthday cake.  And then I got mad at Jeff for not liking what I made.  I was the jerk.

So, who really wants to be at work on a Tuesday?  I asked for permission to leave early, did so, and promptly made a second cake.  I still did the thing with the heavy cream, but this time I used canned chocolate frosting.

And Jeff was happy.

The happiness might have been from the fact that I made homemade pizza, but oh well...  A happy birthday boy is all that counts.

My coworkers sure did like the homemade frosting...

What's your favorite birthday cake?