May Birthdays

With three birthdays in May let's just say that by the end of the month we've had more than our share of sweets. I have been looking for ways to try out Ina Garten's new cookbook, Foolproof, so I decided to make this Carrot Cake with ginger mascarpone icing for my daughter's 21st birthday ( especially since she loves Italian cheese since her study abroad in Florence). As I was in the home stretch making the ginger mascarpone  icing, something went awry. I figured that I over-mixed the icing because it ended up with the consistency of pancake batter. So off to the store for more mascarpone cheese and then a second try. This time I was careful to mix the icing at slow intervals and not for very long (less than a minute for sure). Success! Everyone seemed to love this cake.