The famous birthday cake

It almost seems ridiculous to post a recipe for this cake...but it is sooo yummy!  I tried finding an official recipe online, and saw a few that are similar, but not the same. So I don't know if that means my mother-in-law modified one or if it truly is a secret family recipe--in any case, the secret is out...

Ingredients:
Cream--I suppose that half and half or something else could work, but we always use heavy whipping cream.  We've toyed with using Cool Whip and re-whipping to add the chocolate, but never had...I don't think it would turn out as well.  For this cake I used about 2 C
chocolate syrup--any will do, but Hershey's is the best...don't know why, just trust me.  For this recipe I used about 2T
graham crackers--if you can find the "big" ones, I like them best, lately all I've been able to find are the "half" ones, which are great for smores, but a pain for this recipe.  I used almost a whole box (one partial sleeve from an open box and one whole new sleeve) It is ok if they are getting a little stale/soft (but if they taste stale, they might be too far gone)
optional fruit--not part of the "original" recipe, but for several years we've been adding raspberries to the top of our creation--strawberries would be yummy, too...or whatever you want.  I used one pint of raspberries for this one, they didn't cover the whole top, but looked pretty.

Directions:
Pour cream into a glass bowl (chilled, if you remember), add chocolate syrup (enough to make it taste as chocolate-y as you would like) and whip by whatever method you usually use until stiff. (I use my fabulous $6.99 hand mixer).

For the cake plate, I usually  take a tupperware-like container, flip the lid , so the part that snaps into the bowl is up, and put down some wax paper.  When I'm done building the cake I just put the bowl part on top like a cake carrier. You can use a plate, or a cake carrier, or whatever you want--something like a plate though that can be covered.  The cake needs to be refrigerated overnight (ideally) and the cream will absorb smells/tastes from the fridge if not covered.  It is tricky to do the "toothpick and saran wrap" method with this cake, it can be pretty unstable at first (it firms up overnight).

Place graham crackers in a single layer on your "cake plate".  The cake can be bigger than one graham cracker, as large as you want to deal with, actually.  The only trick is that all the crackers need to touch with as little room between as possible.  Some years I've put a very thin layer of the whipped topping under the first layer of crackers to hold them in place, but this year the cake was small enough that I didn't need to do that.  The cake pictured is about 9 inches long and about 4 inches wide at the base, which was 3 "half" graham crackers end to end with 3 halves (of the halves) to make it wider. Spread whipped topping on crackers--the thicker it is the more unstable your cake and the fewer layers you'll be able to stack.  There is a happy medium though...you want enough whipped cream that the graham crackers can absorb the moisture and become soft and cake-like, but not so much that the cake tips over as you build it. Between a quarter and half inch seems to work pretty well.  Continue to add layers (graham crackers, whipped topping, repeat) until the cake reaches the height you would like.  This cake was about 3 inches tall.  I could have gone taller, but was running out of crackers and this was plenty for the four of us to have a piece both last night and tonight. If you haven't "frosted" the sides with the whipped topping as you went, frost the sides.  Decorate with fruit, cover, and refrigerate (ideally for about 24 hours).

After 24 hours, take out of the refrigerator, slice, and serve (with ice cream) if you would like.  Enjoy!