Rule #1: don’t ask your 5-year old what kind of cake he wants for his birthday unless you are prepared to deliver it at all costs. Rule #2: When at first you don’t succeed, don’t let him see the panic in your eyes. MAKE IT HAPPEN. Rule #3: When you finally cobble together something that resembles what he wanted, be proud even if it isn’t picture perfect!
My big guy turns 5 this weekend. I don’t bake, but it’s his birthday, I’m gourmet mommy, OF COURSE I’m going to make his cake. Even though I. Don’t. Bake. That’s ok, other people bake and I can follow a recipe. It’s against my nature, but I can do it if I really focus. And if I could find my measuring spoons, which I can’t. Darn. I’m sure my soup spoon is about a teaspoon. ish.
Ok, buddy, what kind of cake do you want? Please let it be easy, please let it be a blue square or a yellow circle or something equally simple and straightforward. Maybe a nice Finding Nemo scene with some blue frosting and purchased fish candies all over it. Or a Cars cake with a race track and some of his cars strategically placed on top. Or even better, a nice cheesecake from Whole Foods.
“A chocolate angry birds yoda cake”. What. The. Eff.
A chocolate cake. Already harder to make and decorate than a vanilla or carrot cake because of all of those crumbs, it can get dry. That’s ok, Barefoot Contessa has a recipe, I can’t go wrong. It calls for a cup of coffee but I’m sure that’s fine to serve to a bunch of 5-year old boys, right?
Angry birds and yoda. Apparently Angry Birds has teamed up with Star Wars to co-brand some stuff. So does this guy look more like a bird or yoda? And seriously, how am I going to make that greyish green color out of food coloring and frosting?
Step 1: make the cake. The night before the party I rock out in the kitchen with my bevvie and make Beatty’s Chocolate Cake from Ina Garten. Everything is looking good until I try to carefully move it to a storage plate, and it crumbles in my hands. I don’t know if I overcooked it or didn’t actually measure anything accurately but it was a disaster. Too late to do anything else, I’m probably going to the Harris Teeter in the morning to get an actual cake.
Step 2: wake up in the morning determined and make another cake. I know I can do this. Maybe this time I’ll actually measure the ingredients. And, yes, now I have 2 half sheet cakes that that are kind of holding their shape, plus the broken cakes in the fridge from the night before. I can make something from this.
Step 3: consult internet for yoda food coloring mix. Not surprisingly, there is a lot of material out there on this topic. Apparently a combination of green and some cocoa power does the trick.
Step 4: draw yoda shape (at this point I’ve given up on any angry birds integration) on wax paper, and use as a tracing pattern to cut out foiled cakes. Place on top of frosted 1/2 sheet cakes and start decorating with the weird grey/green frosting. Add some clever birthday message written in yoda-speak. Attempt to cover all mistakes with frosting borders. Feel bad because my cake is not going to be the darling of Pinterest.
Step 5: Sing happy birthday at party. Accept shower of praise from a sea of 5-year old boys. Because they think a chocolate cake with a giant yoda face is grey/green is pretty much the awesomest thing they have ever seen. Have a 10-minute conversation with one of his friends about exactly how I made it because he loved it so much. Question why I felt less than amazing about hand making and delivering exactly what my baby wanted for his birthday just because it wouldn’t win a photography award.
Step 6: have him help me make cake pops out of that leftover broken cake to send to his class on his actual birthday. Feel awesome because I actually couldn’t have planned it better.
I love pinterest and blogging and twitter and seeing all of the amazing things that people out there create. But I think it’s so important to remind ourselves that even if everything in life isn’t picture perfect, it still may be absolutely perfect. Don’t forget to enjoy and live in the moment, even if that means you can’t capture it in a photo!
Cheers!
