My birthday in quarantine was amazing. I got calls from all my kids. I received cards in the mail and packages from very nice delivery people. There was a fern, fluffy purple slippers, paints, a painting kit, a DVD, and so much love!

Friends stopped by with a fig tree (social distancing was observed). I can see why Adam and Eve chose the leaves of a fig tree for making their loincloths, it is a small tree with huge leaves. But I have to tell you, the new leaves smell like cat pee. We were yelling at Cyrus and looking for pee spots on the floor for half the day—until we realized the aroma was coming from the tree. LOL It is now outside enjoying sunshine and growing yummy figs. Thank you, Lorne and Sherri.

When we lived in Minnesota, our family’s main birthday celebration place was Buca di Beppo. So keeping with tradition, Jeff drove over to Franklin and brought back a lovely dinner from Buca with my favorite Chicken Limone! I am so spoiled.

Then we binge watched the new season of Bosch! It released on my birthday. Yes!

But the icing on the cake was making my birthday cake with the help of my roommate, Randi. She is a professional cake and cookie decorator. (How lucky am I to be in quarantine with her?) We share a love of cooking, baking, and making food pretty. So I asked her to teach me to make a mirror glaze cake. I have seen them done on cooking shows (watch Zumbo’s Just Desserts if you want to be wowed). But I knew there would be tips and tricks to learn from someone who has done them before. It was a blast! The process is really pretty simple.

First Randi made a cake. It was a box of devil’s food cake with added sour cream and mayo for moistness. She baked two six inch cakes that we split in half. I iced each layer with a thin coating of chocolate ganache.

Then I piped a line of ganache on the edge of each layer and filled the center with strawberry filling.

The whole cake was then given a thin layer of buttercream icing. The buttercream evens out the layers and makes a great surface for the mirror glaze to hang onto. It took some finessing to get a finished, smooth surface. Randi had a big plastic icing smoother that worked really well even for a novice like me.

We put the cake in the freezer and made the mirror glaze, dividing it into three colors, white, purple, and teal. It is a very sticky mixture of gelatin, sweetened condensed milk, sugar, and white chocolate. It is sweet but it goes on so thin, it doesn’t overwhelm the cake.

Then it was a matter of pouring the glaze over the cold cake.

Voila! Gorgeous cake with amazing flavor.

My quarantined birthday was fabulous thanks to all the friends and family who showered me with love through social media, deliveries, and calls. I cannot thank you all enough!

But first, let’s eat cake!