Flour Shop’s Amirah Kassem Likes to Spend Her Nights In with Coloring Books and Ice Cream

Perfect Night In is a series where we ask actors, artists, entrepreneurs, and beyond how they’d spend the ultimate luxury—a blissful evening at home.

Amirah Kassem’s personality is as sweet as the desserts she makes at her NYC bakery Flour Shop. Out of all the sugary delights she whips up, Kassem is most known for her Rainbow Explosion Cake—you know, the one that spills out sprinkles and sugar pearls (see below).

But Kassem doesn’t just stop at rainbow cakes, cake pops, and cake balls (she really likes cake, FYI). She has a standing collaboration with Williams Sonoma where you can buy everything from cake kits to colorful party crackers and even a smiley spatula that helps fight child hunger. On top of that, she released a collection with Pottery Barn late last year, and she recently published her third cookbook.

So how does confectioner unwind at home after coming down from the sugar rush? Well… with more dessert. Oh, and you will crave sugar after reading this—you’ve been warned.

Describe your perfect homebody scene: Pizza, ice cream, puzzles, sweatpants.

Are you alone or with someone else? Always with someone else, in this case usually my husband Ross Harrow.

What’s your night-in uniform? I’m obsessed with Morgan Lane just because everything is so soft.

What two people, dead or alive, would you let crash your night? Definitely think Willy Wonka would be one of them. Now that you’re saying crash, the Mad Hatter would be such a fun addition to a party. I just want to see their interaction, could you imagine? Usually I entertain other people but they would entertain me.

Favorite cozy product: I have a blanket that my mom made for me that I love.

TV or a movie? Usually a movie. I like to fully go into something that starts and ends at the same time.

What are you watching? Audrey Hepburn movies. “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” ”Roman Holiday,” “Sabrina,” all those movies are pretty much my go-tos. But then I love rom-coms, “Clueless,” or all the fun girly movies. And “Willy Wonka” and “Alice In Wonderland” are two that I always watch when I need to get in touch with my creativity again.

Silence or music? Oh I cannot be quiet, it has to be music. Usually anything that’s going to make me dance. A lot of pop, Latin, anything happy.

E-books or the real deal? Print books.

What are you reading? Coloring books are my preferred kind of book. I sometimes just enjoy a Lisa Frank situation.

Board games: yay or nay? Yay! They usually involve lots of people, but I love playing Scattergories or Bananagrams.

Order in or cook for yourself? Cook.

What are you eating? We love making pasta together. We also have a movie theater popcorn machine in our house, so I usually run that for snacking.

What drink are you pouring? I’m sort of like a five-year-old when it comes to beverages because I usually drink water, lemonade, and chocolate milk. Hot chocolate in the winter.

What’s for dessert? I always have ice cream ready to go in my freezer, but I usually take our cookie dough from Flour Shop, keep that in my freezer. I just pop a cookie cake in the oven to eat with my ice cream because I love a warm dessert.

Late night snack? I think it’s ice cream, even though I’ve said that a lot.

Do you have a self-care ritual? I’m pretty bad at everything except for Drunk Elephant, and they make it very easy for me to have this three-step thing of here’s the wash, here’s the serum, here’s the lotion. I think I was sucked in by their packaging but stuck with them because it actually feels so good.

What do you try to avoid at all costs? Anything that isn’t comfy. I also don’t like being in silence at any moment. I’ll brush my teeth to music.

Candles: yay or nay? Nay.

Face masks: yay or nay? Yay!

Bubble bath: yay or nay? I just love making giant bubbles, so I feel like I mostly just play with bubbles versus actually play a bubble bath.

Chores: yay or nay? No, nay.

Ideal bedtime? 9:30 to 10 p.m. is the sweet spot.

Thanks for chatting with us, Amirah!