What is it about cake that makes us all go cray-cray? For me, it’s the celebration aspect. It’s the sugar. It’s Rihanna. Cake signals good times ahead, so it’s no wonder that cake-flavored everything has become an American staple in recent years.

Photo via Betty Crocker

Though I don’t think all cake-flavored items are successful, I support the phenomenon. When executed correctly (see: Birthday Cake Flipz) the flavor is something truly worth celebrating. So OBVIOUSLY when one of our favorite blogs The Impulsive Buy posted a picture of Ben & Jerry’s Cake My Day ice cream, I knew I had work to do. At the time, Ben & Jerry’s Cake My Day was so new that it wasn’t listed on Ben & Jerry’s website. It’s since been added, but the product locator yields no results for my area. But I know better than that – inventory information is slow to play catch-up. Hours after Winter Storm Jonas pummeled my city, I strapped on the running shoes and went on a mission. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.

Ben & Jerry’s Cake My Day ice cream is a limited batch flavor that features vanilla cake batter ice cream, vanilla cake pieces, buttercream frosting, & raspberry swirl. Yes, yes, yes, and yes. Running to locate this was a significant waste of calories that I’ve been trying to hoard this winter, so let’s get right to the review  to replenish my fat reserves.

The vanilla cake batter base in Ben & Jerry’s Cake My Day tastes like a blend of smooth vanilla ice cream and buttercream frosting. I can’t really tell where the buttercream frosting exists, whether as a swirl or if it were mixed into the base. My inclination is that it’s mixed in, because the ice cream base bleeds this flavor to turn ordinary vanilla into something much more special. What I love about this base is that’s not sickly sweet like some buttercream frosting is – I tend to find a lot of buttercream frostings used on ice cream cakes to be so sweet in an artificial way. Not here.

The vanilla cake pieces, having sat in ice cream for a few weeks, chew dense like a brownie and are bursting with vanilla flavor. After eating a few, I picked up on a little tinge of that Play-doh taste that plagued Lenny & Larry’s Birthday Cake Complete Cookie in the cake pieces, but nowhere near as extreme. I kid you not, there is something Play-doh-y that I do not understand. From a textural standpoint, though, the cake pieces are welcomed.

This next paragraph will be entirely about the choice of raspberry swirl. When I posted the photo of Ben & Jerry’s Cake My Day ice cream to Instagram, common complaints were that “raspberry ruins it.” Oh my, how I beg to differ with you idiots. This raspberry swirl is not only the best part, it helps tie the flavors together and complete the full cake experience. The raspberry swirl tastes like that ooey-gooey, sweet & syrupy fruit section that breaks up the layers in a layer-cake, like in this one for example. It’s tart and delicious like raspberry jam, and it tastes remarkably authentic because it uses both raspberry puree and raspberry juice concentrate. Had they gone without raspberry swirl, this ice cream would have felt a little boring. Had they gone with strawberry, it would probably taste like Strawberry Not So Shortcake. They could have gone with cherry, but that would have been stupid. This was the correct call.

Bottom Line: Ben & Jerry’s Cake My Day just caked my day, and I’m overjoyed that I was able to find it. It might be my favorite cake batter ice cream I’ve had out of a pint or quart, and the raspberry swirl was the perfect choice for this flavor whether you like it or not. The vanilla cake pieces hold it back a bit, but the base ice cream tastes like buttercream frosting blended right into vanilla ice cream. You can cake that to the bank, baby.

How Many Cake Puns I Have Left In Me Rating: 1 out of 10
Ate So Much I Have A Stomach Cake Rating: 9 out of 10
Overall Rating: 7.5 out of 10