Anneta Konstantinides/Insider
- The PieCaken has pecan pie, pumpkin pie, spice cake, and apple-pie filling, all in one dessert.
- I tried it for the first time and couldn't believe how delicious every layer was.
- The PieCaken wowed everyone at my Friendsgiving.
PieCaken
My Thanksgiving dinners usually come to an end with my dad's famous baklava or a slice of apple pie. And while I like pumpkin pie just as much as the next person, I never understood why it was always the top holiday dessert.
So when I heard about the PieCaken — a 6-pound cake with four different desserts stuffed inside — I knew I had to try it.
PieCaken
Kelly Ripa once said that the Thanksgiving dessert — which can still be purchased for $99 on Goldbelly and ships across the US — was the "greatest thing that happened to me, besides the birth of my children."
There's a pecan pie on the bottom, followed by a pumpkin pie layer, and then spice cake on top. If that's not enough, there's apple-pie filling in the center, and everything is held together by cinnamon buttercream.
Cindy Ord/Stringer/Getty Images
PieCaken is the brainchild of Zac Young, who first came up with the idea in 2015 while he was working as the executive pastry chef of David Burke Fabrick in New York City. The restaurant's executive chef was serving a Turducken special (a chicken stuffed into a duck stuffed into a turkey), and Young decided he wanted to make a sweet version.
Young was just planning to make a dessert he could serve by the slice, according to PieCaken's website. But when he posted a photo on Instagram, the PieCaken immediately took off.
Six years later and the PieCaken is still a hit. But is it worth the hype? I decided to find out.
Anneta Konstantinides/Insider
The PieCaken was shipped with dry ice. Per the instructions, I stuck it in the fridge the night before I planned to serve it, and let it sit out on the counter for two hours before digging in.
Unlike many desserts, the PieCaken can actually be stored in the freezer for up to three months if it's tightly wrapped in its original packaging. It also lasts in the fridge for up to seven days.
Anneta Konstantinides/Insider
The 5-inch cake is covered in an oat crumble, and the colors pair well with the pale-pink cinnamon buttercream. I brought the PieCaken to a Friendsgiving dinner, and its appearance wowed everyone at the table.
Anneta Konstantinides/Insider
For a cake that had been sitting in a box with dry ice just a day before, I was surprised by how fresh and juicy the apple-pie filling looked. I could smell that warm and comforting combination of cinnamon, apples, and nutmeg from the moment I unwrapped everything.
Anneta Konstantinides/Insider
As you can see, the four layers are perfectly separated and easily distinguishable throughout the cake. The pecan pie glistened on the bottom, the pumpkin pie in the middle had a pretty orange hue, and the spice cake looked fluffy on top.
With so many different pies incorporated into one dessert, I wondered if the PieCaken would turn into a big mess. But each slice looked beautiful with its clean lines and autumn colors.
Anneta Konstantinides/Insider
The pecan pie was, without a doubt, my favorite layer. I loved that it had a classic pie crust on the bottom (you can't have pie without the crust, it's the law), the filling was a knockout, and the pecans gave everything a great crunch.
The pumpkin pie layer was beautifully creamy and had a nice subtle spice to it. Like the pecan layer, it had its own deliciously flaky crust, and all the flavors paired well with the cinnamon buttercream frosting.
It was the spice cake that surprised me most. Just by looking at it, I expected the cake to taste quite dense — almost like a pound cake — but it was actually light as air. I couldn't believe how fluffy it tasted, and the layer was a great vessel for the heavy apple-pie filling on top.
Anneta Konstantinides/Insider
I tasted each individual layer before trying a big bite of everything all together, and was surprised that none of the different pies clashed with each other. It's really a cornucopia of holiday flavors all coming together.
I should note that this dessert is definitely sweet. The different pies combined with the cinnamon buttercream was just a bit too much for some of my friends who sampled it, although they all loved the individual layers.
But if you're looking for the ultimate holiday indulgence, the PieCaken fits the bill.
Anneta Konstantinides/Insider
The PieCaken serves 12 to 16 people, which makes it great for either a Friendsgiving or a big Thanksgiving dinner. I brought my leftovers to another party the next day, and it was so fun watching everyone get excited about all the different pies in the cake.
And as someone who doesn't abide by Thanksgiving dessert traditions, I thought the PieCaken was a really great way to sample a bunch of different holiday flavors at the dinner table.
I'll be the first to admit that I'm a skeptic when it comes to crazy desserts that sometimes seem like they were made more for Instagram grids than our stomachs. But the PieCaken is the real deal, and I'm not surprised that its brought holiday cheer to so many people — Kelly Ripa included — for so many years.
I tried the PieCaken, a 6-pound cake stuffed with 3 pies, and it was worth the $99 I paid for it
Source: Kalayaan News
0 comments :
Post a Comment