It’s Pancake Yancake’s 1st birthday! Now to me, birthday cake always tastes better than the “everyday” kind of cake, so we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to make an inherently tastier cake today! Naturally, Felicia and I immediately thought it’d be fun to make a multilayer cake out of pancakes (we are Pancake Yancake after all). But after giving that idea more thought, we decided our shared birthday with baby Prince George warranted some NYC sophistication.

The spongiest green tea cream lies betwixt twenty delicate crepes that stack high into one mesmerizing masterpiece, Lady M’s Green Tea Mille Crêpes cake. So to celebrate 365 days of food blogging, we recreated this NYC favorite of ours in the comfort of our Florida kitchen.

Green Tea Mille Crêpes Birthday Cake

Makes 4 large servings

Ingredients:

For the crepe batter:

• 3/4 cup milk
• 1/2 cup water
• 2 large eggs
• 1 cup flour
• 3 tbsp butter, melted and cooled
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 tbsp sugar
• 1 tbsp matcha powder
• Pinch of salt

For the cream filling*:

• Matcha pastry cream + 2 tbsp sugar added to the original recipe
• 4 oz cool whip, thawed

*Next time we make this cake, we’ll probably try using matcha mousse for the filling instead for a spongier texture

Directions:

1. To make the crepe batter, blend together all its ingredients in a blender. Refrigerate batter for 1 hour to allow air bubbles to subside. Let batter come to room temperature before using. Meanwhile, make matcha pastry cream as that also needs time to set in the refrigerator.
2. To cook your crepes, oil a small skillet (you only need to do this for the first crepe). Over medium heat, pour less than 1/4 cup of batter into a small non-stick skillet and swirl to form a thin, even layer. When you start to see the edges lift of the sides of the skillet, flip and cook the other side for another minute. Remove from heat and lay flat to cool. Repeat this step until you run out of batter (makes ~16 crepes).
3. As crepes are cooling, prepare the cream filling by mixing the cool whip into the chilled pastry cream.
4. To assemble the cake, alternate with layers of crepe and filling, ending and starting with crepe. Dust top of cake with matcha powder if desired. Refrigerate overnight before slicing to allow the cream to soften the crepe layers. Allow to return to room temperature before eating.