Paul’s Birthday: It’s All About The Cake

I would be remiss not to do a post about Paul’s birthday.

We celebrated Paul’s birthday this past Wednesday — one of the hottest days for October in recorded history. Last year, we celebrated in Cleveland and Paul didn’t have a cake. Instead, we had frozen custard and Paul’s was flavored with birthday cake — a speciality flavor at the shop. To make up for the lack of a cake last year, I hired fellow food blogger (and someone I greatly admire), Jenny Williams with the task of making a cake.

It would be an understatement to say that Jenny is one of the premier bakers in San Diego County. She recently gave up her day job as a medical chemist to pursue baking full-time. The fact that it’s required to book a cake with her weeks in advance is a testament to how popular she is. She makes all her cakes with the finest ingredients and they are all customized. Fancy a cake with vanilla and coffee flavors and decorated with a lifelike peony? She can do it all.

For Paul’s birthday, I ordered a white chocolate mud cake with filled with whipped chocolate ganache. Up until the last minute, I had no idea what kind of decoration the cake should have. I was fiddling with a Doctor Who-related theme, then I realized I’d be decorating a cake for myself! At the very last minute, I asked Jenny to put a simple 4 with a circle around it — the Fantastic Four logo — no explanation offered if you know Paul. Without any hesitation, Jenny added it and even included a ‘Happy Birthday’ on the side to complete the cake.

The result was a very beautiful and simply decorated cake and Paul was impressed. Decorations are nice and dandy but if they don’t taste good, what’s the point? But it was delicious. The white chocolate mud cake was dense and almost poundcake-like and not cloyingly sweet. Although the cake only served eight, it was pretty heavy for its size. We paced ourselves with the slices to make it last, right down to the last scrap of fondant.

While I would love to order a cake from her every week regardless if there’s a special occasion or not, Jenny offers a set sampler pack of six cupcakes and three flavors almost every week for $15. Details are available on her Facebook page. For those living outside of San Diego, Jenny also offers handmade toppers for cakes and cupcakes for sale on Etsy. All you have to do is provide the cake. For all other requests or to check out what else she has to offer, please visit her website.

With the cake and a fantastic dinner at Truluck’s for stone crab feast, it was very happy celebration.