Ice Cream S'mores Cake

See my lovebug in the middle? She got married just over a month ago (infamous twice worn purple dress, sssshhh) and her wedding was absolutely gorgeous and an amazing time. Great food, good music, danced until 2 am, and met some wonderful new people. After dinner, when the dancing started up again before dessert, there were servers walking around with little ice cream cones that had to have been on freshly made cones because the smell took over the ballroom, and it was a huge ballroom. 

Ever since that night I've been wanting to make something ice cream related and this week I finally got my chance. Bikini season is on its way out so I feel a little less guilty about this one. I had made ice cream s'mores in the past, but it was time to one up that little endeavor with an ice cream cake. 

Ladies and gentleman what you are looking at (from bottom to top) is graham cracker cake, ice cream, brownie, more ice cream, another graham cracker cake, and toasted marshmallow fluff. That's quite a bit to take in, I know. It also took 2 days to complete. Let me break it down for you:

- On the first night I baked the graham cracker cakes. I'm sure there are real recipes out there for this, but this genius idea came to me at 11pm and I have to wake up at 7am, so modified Betty Crocker was called for. I used a normal box of yellow cake mix, only I scooped out one cup of the dry mix and added almost 2 cups of graham cracker crumbs for the flavor and a bit over a teaspoon of baking powder to lighten things up, everything else including the baking times I went according to the directions. I also baked the brownie layer this night. I used the same cake pan for all three of these parts to ensure equal size. 

- On the second day (I woke up extra early to put it together) I spread ice cream over one of the graham cracker cake layers and the brownie layer and put them back in the freezer. I spread marshmallow fluff over the other graham cracker cake and placed it under the broiler to make it toasty. I then layered them, filled in any gaps with ice cream, smoothed the edges, and put it back in the freezer until nighttime. 

It was perfect. 

Ice Cream S'mores

I have several obsessions: my nephews, my gym, Nintendo, my frying pan, bacon cheeseburgers, Barbies, ice cream on skinny days, frozen yogurt on fat days, and S'mores. I'm sure there are more things but that last one I mentioned is the relevant one for this post. Ice cream and S'mores, awesome on their own, they have to be even more awesome together, right? YUP! 

One of the greatest creations, I must say, are those silicone baking trays. I have a square one that I used to make a giant marshmallow once. I also have a silicone cupcake baking tray and I used it to make the chocolate cups for these ice cream s'mores. They popped right out. I used just plain chocolate chips melted on a double boiler. If you plan on making this, and have a not so steady hand like I do, and fear you can't make thin cups, add some heavy cream and have it be a ganache. That way when you bite into the cup, you'll actually be able to. I used just the plain melted chocolate but made the cups a tad too thick and they were, how do I put this nicely as to not insult myself? Hearty, let's go with that. They were hearty. 

Once the cups were cooled, I layered broken up graham crackers, vanilla ice cream (clearly, a skinny day), more broken up graham crackers, and then a top layer of chocolate. Back to the freezer they went to firm up and not even an hour later, look at what I had! An awesome midnight snack.