Whenever my birthday falls on a weekday, I take the day off. I’ve been doing this for a while, but now thanks to Tom Haverford, this day is now known as Treat Yo Self Day. Instead of fragrances, mimosas and fine leather goods, this year I treated myself to a pedicure and a facial, where the esthetician asked me, no joke, if I had the day off SCHOOL. Love that!

After a super relaxing Tuesday, I had delicious dinner of my childhood favourites with my Mom and Dad, and thanked them for their good genes!  Of course I made us a little birthday cake, and in keeping with the theme, I made a Rainbow Bit Cake, which was always my cake of choice in my tween and teen years. I was really amazed that this recipe tasted EXACTLY like the one from the box; I think the key is the almond extract. To get the rainbow bits you just stir in a few handfuls of sprinkles; but don’t overstir or the colours will start to blend and turn your batter kind of blueish.

Rainbow Bit Birthday Cake

Source: Cake from Sweetapolita, frosting from Joy the Baker Cookbook

Yield: two 8″ cake layers (I halved the recipe and baked it in two little 6″ cake pans), I’m sure these would also be amazing cupcakes

Ingredients

Rainbow Bit Cake

1 cup milk, room temperature, divided

6 egg whites, room temperature

2 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 tsp almond extract

2 3/4 cups cake flour (I used all-purpose and it was just fine)

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 tbsp + 1 tsp baking powder

3/4 tsp salt

3/4 cup butter (1 1/2 sticks), cut into cubes, room temperature

1/2 cup rainbow sprinkles

Vanilla Bean Buttercream Frosting

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, room temperature

4 cups icing sugar

2 tbsp milk or cream

1 vanilla bean, seeds scraped

Directions

  1. For cake, preheat the oven to 350, and spray your cake pans with nonstick spray.
  2. In a small bowl, stir together 1/4 cup of the milk, egg whites, vanilla and almond extract and set aside.
  3. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Add the butter and blend on low speed until mixed together (watch for flying flour).
  4. Add the remaining milk and mix together until well blended, then add the egg white mixture, and mix again until smooth and everything is incorporated. Gently fold in the sprinkles.
  5. Pour batter into pans and bake for 25-35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean.
  6. For icing, whip the butter on high speed until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add 3 cups of icing sugar and mix until incorporated, then add the milk/cream and vanilla bean seeds and beat on high until light and fluffy. Add the last cup of icing sugar and whip again until combined and smooth.

P.S. We also had my childhood fave junk food combination of champions, Crunchits and Smartfood, and then I flipped through a People Magazine my Mom gave me only to find my teen obsession on the back page! It might as well have been 1994!