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There are desserts that are made to showcase certain flavors or techniques, and then there are desserts that are just here to party. This cake is the latter, and boy does it know how to party. It's got layers of funfetti cake, layers of edible cookie dough, yellow cake buttercream, and a rapsberry ganache drip. It looks like animal crackers had a baby with a layer cake, and tastes like your childhood.
I love this cake for a lot of reasons, but the primary one is the buttercream. The yellow cake buttercream is made with the ermine buttercream method, which is my go-to buttercream method. If you find Swiss meringue buttercream too buttery but American buttercream too sweet, I'm thrilled to introduce you to ermine. Ermine is an old-school technique, where you make a sweetened milk and flour custard. The custard is then cooled and whipped with butter, making a frosting that tastes like whipped cream! I switched it up here by replacing the flour with yellow cake mix, creating a buttercream that tastes just like the best parts of a boxed yellow cake.

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I signed up to follow page on another person’s recommendation. I didn’t realize you can’t look at a single recipe unless you BUY it! WOW…..what a racket. Everybody wants to come up with a get rich quick scheme these days
The majority of the recipes on my site are free, and I’ve chosen to put some behind a paywall rather than use ads. Feel free to check out the free recipes, or to use one of the many wonderful food blogs out there that are all free!
Hi!! Can’t wait to make this. What size offset spatula do you recommend?
Hi! A small plastic-handled offset is my fave, like Ateco’s 4.5″ offset spatula! Wood handles are great too and more stylish, but I always feel like wood never gets as clean so plastic is my preference.
Hot damn this was so good! That buttercream is DELICIOUS. All my co workers loved the taste and how it wasn’t overpoweringly sweet. I think it’s going to become my go to for birthday cakes. The cake itself was also pretty damn good. I got lazy and didn’t do the cookie dough layer or the drip, but next time (and there will be many multiple next times) I shall do it.
That being said I did have to cook the custard part of the ermine buttercream for way longer than the recipe indicated. My first batch was too runny and it didn’t turn out ok. The second one I cooked way longer (maybe like 5-10 mins after it started boiling?) and the buttercream turned out perfect!
Glad I was able to get this recipe, thank you for sharing! Def worth the five bucks 🙂
I’m so glad to hear that you liked it!! The frosting is my absolute fave. I’m sorry that your first batch was runny – I’m wondering if altitude and/or brand of cake mix had an impact. Where are you located, and what brand of cake mix did you use?
The buttercream really tastes like butter to me. The consistency is already like sour cream, but is the answer to correct the flavor to beat it more? Or maybe this is just a taste preface? I don’t eat a lot of cakes – or bake really so what do I know?! 🙂
Hi Elizabeth, beating more won’t change the flavor much if your consistency is already like sour cream. Did you make any adjustments to the recipe, like reducing sugar or leaving out the cake mix?
Not intentionally! I probably didn’t measure closely enough – this is why this is just my test cake. 🙂
Hi Lani,
For the cookie dough portion of the recipe does the AP flour need to be heat treated at all?
Thank you.
Hi Janelle, I typically don’t use HT flour because the flour quantity in each final cake serving is so small as to be unlikely to present a risk, but you could absolutely use HT flour if you’re more comfortable with it! You can bake the flour at 350F for about 10 minutes to do so. Let it cool and proceed with the recipe as written.