In honor of my birthday this past Wednesday, I wanted to share a new recipe for the craziest cake I ever made! I’ll admit I’m not the most creative/skilled when it comes to design, but I definitely enjoy experimenting in the kitchen with cool new ideas.

I’m not a fan of most cakes, and I generally prefer cookies, pie, or ice cream as dessert. (My husband is the same way…we had donuts at our wedding instead of cake!) However, I find cakes to be very beautiful, and I think they’re really fun to make, too. They also are perfect for birthdays because you can write messages on top.

A friend of mine had a birthday last month, and she doesn’t like cake either. In fact, she doesn’t really like sweets at all! So, I made her a cake…but it wasn’t made out of cake! Instead, it was Jalapeño Cheddar Bread that I baked in a round cake pan, frosted with plain cream cheese, filled with pickled jalapeños, and decorated with queso sauce that I dyed pink and green.

It was so much fun to make!

I even made a savory “fondant” out of crushed up crackers mixed with cream cheese (the same way you’d make filling for oreo balls) and froze the dough before cutting it into cactus shapes. I then used crushed up Fritos to make desert sand.

My husband loved the “cake” too, and mentioned that he wouldn’t mind if I ever baked it for him…

In case you and/or your husband have an affinity for Jalapeño Cheddar Bread like we do, I wanted to share the recipe I used (with modifications) so you can recreate this bread for your own non-cake purposes.

Jalapeño Cheddar Bread:

Based off this recipe.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups flour
• 1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup sour cream
• 1/2 cup half-and-half
• 1 egg
• 1/4 cup melted butter
• 2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
• 1 jalapeño, minced

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease two 8-inch spring form cake pans, and set aside.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients (first 5) and set aside. In another bowl. whisk together the sour cream, half-and-half, egg, and melted butter. Pour into the dry ingredients and mix together until combined. (Batter will be thick.) Fold in the cheese and the jalapeños.

Divide batter evenly between the two prepared pans and bake for 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

* Alternatively, use a single 9×5 inch bread pan, and bake for 1 hour or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Cool completely before “frosting.” (For the frosting, I used to 3 packages of cream cheese beat together with 1 cup of sour cream to soften.)

Do you like cake? What are your favorite non-cake desserts?