Boston Cream Crepe Cake

The boston cream crepe cake that I made to celebrate HeatherOMade’s second birthday proved to be a definite labor of love. This translates to “thank goodness it tasted good because I’m not sure I’m going ever take the time to make this again.”

While the ingredients are simple: eggs, flour, milk, etc the time & skill it takes are not. If I were to make this again I’d probably use my old faithful crepe recipe instead of the one I found via Will Cook For Smiles, simply because I’m more comfortable with it & I have a better handle on how they cook.  This new-to-me-recipe was challenging to say the least & I had to scrape & scrap more crepes that I would’ve liked to (don’t worry there’s a photo of the crepe graveyard). But hey it was a new life lesson. Once I had all of the components ready (crepes, custard & chocolate ganache) the assembling of the cake was fun & therapeutic finish to the whole experience. Although my cake wasn’t as high as I aspired it to be it was still delicious & didn’t last a day at the office when I brought it into share.



Recipe via Will Cook For Smiles 

Ingredients for custard:

• 1 cup of whole milk (I used what I had - 1% milk)
• 2/3 cup of heavy cream (I used half & half)
• 2/3 cup granulated sugar
• Pinch of salt
• 4 large egg yolks
• 3 tablespoons flour
• 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Make the custard!

1. Whisk together the egg yolks and sugar until completely combined. 
2. Add flour, whisk very well and set aside while heating the milk. 
3. Heat milk, heavy cream, butter and salt until simmering. 
4. Slowly add the heated milk mixture into the egg yolk mixture stirring constantly. Whisk well, slowly. 
5. Return the mixture into the pot and bring to simmer stirring constantly. 
6. The mixture will thicken within 30-45 seconds (for me it took more like a minute or two). Take off heat! Whisk in the vanilla, set aside to cool to room temperature. (I found chilling it in the fridge helped my impatient ways)

Ingredients for Crepes:

• 2 cups flour
• 3 eggs
• 2/3 cup milk
• 1/4 cup veggie oil
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 4 tbs sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3 to 3 1/2 cups of boiling water*
• butter for the pan

Make the crepes!

1. Preheat a non-stick pan on medium high heat. 
2. Combine flour, eggs, milk, oil, salt, sugar and baking soda. 
3. Whisk all well. 
4. Slowly, start adding 1/4 cup of the hot water at a time to the batter. 
5. Whisking constantly until the batter reaches the consistency of melted ice cream. 
6. Pour about a ladle-full into the hot pan and swirl slowly. 
7. For this cake, I used a little bit more batter on each crepe and spread around to about 8-inch round crepe. (Normally, I use 1/2 ladle-full.) 
8. Cook for a few seconds on each side, until golden. (Look for the bubbles on top to know when the underside is ready to flip. The batter will look almost "dry")

Ingredients for Ganache:

• 4 ounces semisweet chocolate (I used about 1 cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips)
• 1/2 cup heavy cream, boiling (I used half & half)
• sprinkles for garnish (optional)

Make the ganache!

1. Bring the heavy cream to boil, be careful not to let it actually boil or it will raise.
2. Pour the boiling cream over the chopped chocolate and stir until melted. (If it doesn't thicken enough add some more chocolate - that never hurt anyone!)
3. Cool to a little warmer then room temperature. (Do not refrigerate the leftovers, leave out at room temperature for easier spreading)

Make it all a cake!

1. Start with the dish you are going to serve the cake on.
2. Put one crepe down for the base layer.
3. Spread a somewhat thin layer of custard on each crepe as you stack them of top of each other.
4. Refrigerate for a few hours or overnight to let the cake set. (*Suggestion:* if you want extra security to keep the cake from sliding off while it's chilling, use one of those long, wooden kebab sticks in the center of the cake - or use those big sandwich tooth picks like I did.
5. Pour the ganache over the top of the cake. 
6. Ganache can also be poured on the cold cake, before serving. (I poured a blob on top & then spread it out with an offset spatula.)

This is my crepe grave yard - yes where ugly crepes went to die & left me feeling like I wasn't too far from making this BuzzFeed list of Pinterest fails. But things got better & I hopefully won't make that list.