Birthday Cake Ice Cream Sandwiches

with crushed potato chips :)

Hello sweet friends!!

In the heat of Pride Month, I shared my recipe for birthday cake blondies, which went viral summer of 2023, again on Instagram and TikTok.

My favorite part of creating recipes is seeing that you’ve made a recipe again. and again. and again. And whenever I talk about the bday cake blondies, so many of you say that they’re in your regular rotation. To me, nothing is more special than getting a repeat feature in your kitchen and helping make memories for you around food (you really did the work making the recipe, but I still feel a part!).

The way that culture and love develop around food was a prime reason I became a food studies interdisciplinary major at UNC. I made up the major and course list (with a lot of help from my incredible fellow Heel who had pursued the same major,

Sara Tane

!). I ended up dropping food studies after a semester so I could pursue a dual BA and MA in environmental studies and strategic communication, eager to save the world through business. I have a lot of interests, okay!!!

As bummed as I am that I missed out on the food studies major, I pour myself into food culture stories through a lot of different mediums we can all access. Recipe notes in cookbooks (Ina, of course, has the best). Old copies of Lucky Peach. Cherry Bomb Radio. Conversations with loved ones. And novels.

And that brings us to…

Recommendations

• 📚 Go As A River: Best book I’ve read so far this year!! The protagonist grew up on a generations-old peach farm in Colorado, and the descriptions of food and the land are superb. All this along with a story of the resilience of multiple incredible women? Sign. me. up.

• 📰 Prime Day isn’t a sale. It’s a setup. by Michael Easter: The post is for Michael’s paid subscribers - I am one and really enjoy it. Pay a month or more if you’d like to read the full article. But the main takeaway I gleaned is that Amazon swindles us into spending $23.8B over Prime Days, the equivalent of two Black Fridays, by raising prices in the weeks before Prime Days and then dropping them to get the “Prime Day Deal” badge. Just something to be aware of as conscious consumers. On Prime Days, I’d only look at a sale if there’s something specific you’ve been hunting for. You can also use CamelCamelCamel to check Amazon prices and buy at a good price throughout the year.

This week’s recipe

The birthday cake blondies are getting a sequel as ice cream sandwiches. This has been on my ‘to develop list’ for two summers, and I am stoked that the time has come!!!

Here’s what we’re workin’ with: vanilla and almond-spiked blondie base (AKA birthday cake flavors), creamy vanilla ice cream, and edges rolled in crispy potato chips. I’ve been nicknaming these “3:10 Bell” in my home, since they really have the nostalgia of an afterschool snack.

The blondie base is the same as the birthday cake blondies, but spread thinner in a 9x13 pan, so they work better for ice cream sandwiches.

To make these sammies, you have two options:

1. Cut the blondies out in circles using a mason jar lid or this circle set of cookie cutters. The pro of using a cookie cutter is they’re super cute, and you can make some mini sandwiches with the space between where you cut the big ones. The con is that you do get fewer sandwiches because you can’t use up the entire sheet of blondies. The other pro is that you can eat the leftover scraps or roll them into balls, dip into melted white chocolate, and have blondie bombs.

2. Cut the blondies into squares. The pro is that you will use the whole sheet of blondies. The con is that I think circles are cuter, but that’s personal preference, and square still rocks. You will need to use a ruler and make sure you’re precise on your cuts so that the top and bottom parts of the sandwich match.

A couple very important notes on the recipe:

• You need to prep the blondies the day before or morning before you want to eat the sandwiches. The blondies need to cool completely before you assemble the sandwiches. And once you assemble the sandwiches, THOSE need to freeze completely, otherwise the ice cream will smush out the sides (or you can eat them right away if you’re fine with that). Patience is the name of the game for ice cream sandwiches. And boi lemme tell you, it PAYS OFF.

• You need parchment paper so that you can easily take the blondies out of the tin and cut them for the sandwiches.

• Cookie/ice cream scoops are also helpful in getting an even layer of ice cream into each sandwich. I like this trio - I use them for both cookies and ‘scream.

OKAY let’s get on to the RECIPPPPEEE!

Birthday Cake Ice Cream Sandwiches

Makes 4 large +3 mini circular ice cream sandwiches OR 7 large square ice cream sandwiches

Ingredients

For the blondie base

• 1 2/3 cups (200 grams) all-purpose flour

• 1/2 tsp. baking powder

• 1 tsp. kosher salt or another coarse salt

• 14 TBS. (198 grams) unsalted butter, melted and cooled so it’s just slightly warm

• 1 cup (200 grams) granulated sugar

• 1/3 cup (70 grams) light brown sugar

• 2 eggs

• 2 TBS. vanilla extract

• 1 tsp. almond extract

• 3 TBS. rainbow sprinkles

• Extra rainbow sprinkles to top

For the sandwiches

• 2 pints vanilla ice cream (you will have some left over)

• 1 snack bag of ruffle potato chips (ruffle/ridge potato chips are thicker so they’ll give you more of a crunch in the sandwich than thin ones)

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line 9x13 tin (I love this one from USA Pans [LINK]) with parchment paper, using binder clips to keep the parment in place.

2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt until evenly combined (mix longer than you think you should since everything’s the same color). Set aside while you work on the wet ingredients.

3. Add your melted and cooled butter, granulated sugar and brown sugar to a large bowl. Whisk together well until there is no separation between the butter and sugars . Whisk in the eggs, vanilla extract, and almond extract.

4. Switch to a spatula and fold in the flour mixture until there are only a few streaks of flour left. Add the sprinkles and fold just until they’re spread evenly throughout the batter – don’t overmix.

5. Spread the batter in your prepped 9x13 tin. Sprinkle as many extra sprinkles as you want on top – this will really make them pop when they come out of the oven.

6. Bake for 22-27 minutes, until the edges are golden and a knife stuck in the middle comes out clean or with some moist crumbs attached but not raw batter.

7. Let the blondies cool completely, then cover with plastic wrap and place in the fridge for at least an hour before you’re ready to assemble the sammies.

8. Use the easy handles on your parchment paper to lift the blondies out of the tin. Now you can choose whether to make circular or square sandwiches. You’ll get more sandwiches if you opt for square.

   1. If you’re making circular sandwiches, use a mason jar lid or cookie cutter to cut circles as close together as humanly possible to maximize your number of sandwiches. Eat the remaining scraps, or roll them into balls and dip into melted white chocolate to make blondie bombs.

   2. If you’re making square sandwiches, carefully measure and mark out where to cut the blondies so that they’re all the same size. I’d opt for making three slices on the short side and four slices on the long side. This should give you 7 total blondies.

9. Using a cookie or ice cream scoop slightly smaller than the diameter of your blondies, add a scoop of ice cream on top of the blondie. Spread the ice cream around using a spoon or your fingers. Gently press another blondie on top (this is where chilling the blondies is helpful, since they won’t smush down). Quickly wrap in plastic wrap and put in the freezer. Repeat with the remaining blondies.

10. Let the sandwiches freeze completely, 1-2 hours. Take out from the freezer, roll in a plate of crushed up potato chips, and enjoy!

LMK if you make these! luh u <3

<3

Maddie