The Cake

I have so much I want to remember about Madeline's 3rd birthday. So I am going to cover those things in a few posts starting with Madeline's birthday cake.

Days before the celebration Madeline asked for a giant cupcake for her cake. I had originally tried to find a bakery that would rent a mold like this one. But I was unsuccessful and the thought of spending the money on the pan just wasn't an option. SO.... I improvised.

I started with this cake recipe.


The recipe said to use a sheet cake pan, so I divided the batter into four 8" rounds. I assumed it would make a large cake, but when they baked they had not risen as much as I would have liked to I made a second batter and poured it into two 8" rounds.

I then stacked the original four cakes using chocolate frosting between the layers. It began to list to one side so I stableized it with straws.


I then cut the straws above off at the top of the cake, and then stacked the final two layers (the bigger ones) on top, again, with chocolate frosting between the layers. Then I placed an additional three straws in the whole cake to make sure it didn't slide off.


I iced the bottom sides with chocolate and the top half with vanilla butter cream icing.


Doesn't look like much does it? So I folded some paper to look like cupcake paper and hoped it looked more like a cupcake.


From this view I was skeptical, but this:


This was a little more believable. All that really matters is that Madeline liked it.


And she did.

To cut it I removed the top two layers and served them to everyone. On her actual birthday I iced the bottom four layers in chocolate. Two cakes for the effort of one! (or three...)


She liked that one too.

mg