7 Cool Treats That Are Better than Birthday Cakes

It’s hard to beat a traditional birthday cake. Unless it’s an ice cream cake. Or really anything with ice cream, sorbet, or frozen yogurt — especially when you’re celebrating a birthday in the summer. If someone you love happens to be turning another year older in the next couple of months, consider making them one of these cool treats.

Yes, it’s hard to put candles in some of these, but remember — you’ll probably be outside, and sparklers exist for a reason!

Birthday cake only has cake and frosting. This icebox cake has morsels of chocolate and peanut butter, peanuts, more chocolate, and tender chocolate graham crackers. You already know — without even trying it — that this will go over way better than a vanilla cake. (Even a vanilla cake with funfetti frosting.)

Hopefully if your dessert is dark and stormy, the weather won’t be! This sweet treat features your favorite ginger cookie recipe, plus store-bought vanilla ice cream mixed with lime zest, candied ginger, and molasses. It’s basically what would happen if the classic, boozy drink had a baby with an ice cream cake.

Make these single-serving mini ice cream cakes in a muffin tin and then no one has to be responsible for the cutting. (It’s never as easy as you want it to be!) When it’s time for dessert, they just pop right out.

We normally don’t believe cake has any place in ice cream cake, but this cool treat is worthy of an exception. Two of the three layers are cake (that can be mixed using just one bowl!) and the other is raspberry sorbet. Sorbet instead of ice cream? Cake in an ice cream cake? We know. It’s so wacky it works, though!

Don’t be intimated by all the layers in this ice cream cake. The secret is that they’re made mostly of ice cream sandwiches. A little ice cream, Oreo cookies, and chocolate sauce round out the cake — and it can all come together in about 10 minutes.

If you’re noticing an ice cream sandwich theme here, it’s because they’re super easy to serve to a crowd. The sandwich part of these are made like Rice Krispie Treats, only they feature Lucky Charms instead. (Mind blown, right?)

We’ll never understand why people don’t often serve Popsicles at parties. You don’t even need special molds — you can use little paper cups if you want! These are made with strawberries, Greek yogurt, and a few other simple ingredients. Bonus: The birthday girl can have one for breakfast on her big day, too.