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An advance word of warning: this recipe seems both extremely difficult and extremely time consuming, so we’d advise you only try it if you’re a master chef or incredibly bored. Or if you need to consume a disgusting amount of calories in a short space of time.

Still, in the spirit of Halloween, this sweet cake and gelatin “Ramen Cake” masquerading almost perfectly as real ramen, is a clever, cute substitute for the usual chocolate eyeballs, brain Jell-o and other grotesqueries of the season.

As you can see, the resemblance to real ramen is so uncanny you’d be forgiven for calling foul on the recipe’s author and assuming she just put a cookie and some squiggly candy on top of actual ramen and presented it as a dessert.

Rest assured, though, the author’s credentials stand up: Japanese blogger and chef ochikeron learned of a cake shop that was selling the item and decided to try her hand at it. And she’s got video evidence to prove it can be done, albeit with a lot of elbow grease:

We recommend watching the video to get the specifics on the recipe if you plan on making it yourself, but here’s how it breaks down:

The bottom layer is sponge cake, whipped cream and mashed sweet potatoes.

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The remaining mashed sweet potatoes are strained to a fine, stringy consistency through a pastry bag (or piping bag, for our commonwealth friends), and layered on as the ramen noodles.

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“Broth” is poured over top in the form of tea-flavored gelatin and the whole thing is left to set in the fridge.

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Store-bought cookies and candies resembling traditional ramen toppings garnish the finished product, but this is the step where you can really let your creativity shine. How about adding a whole ice cream cone so it resembles a popular Korean treat and pushes the calories into Epic Meal Time territory?

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Have at it, kids!
[ Read in Japanese ]