Fall Projects - Baby's First Birthday Cake

I may be a stay-at-home mom, but that does not mean that I love to cook. There is a reason I don't blog about food. I certainly can cook, and sometimes I do enjoy it. But while some people cook or bake because they love cooking or baking, I cook and bake because I love eating.

So I make my own food because I want it to be healthy, I want to know exactly what's in it, and because homemade food just tastes better than non-homemade food. I don't live to be in the kitchen. I avoid it whenever possible. But if I decide that I need cookies, pie, or a nice, healthy meal, I make it myself from scratch, just because that's what I want to eat.

As my daughter's first birthday approached, I started thinking about her smash cake. I honestly don't know what I think about the custom of doing a smash cake. It seems odd to celebrate a kid making a mess and overdosing on sugar just because they're turning one. But at the same time, I understand the desire to do something special for your little one, and sweet food is definitely special when you're a baby and your mother has never given you more than one or two bites of dessert! So I decided to just go with the tradition and do something special for my little one-year-old.

The thought of my little baby girl turning one had me all emotional. I pictured myself standing there in the kitchen making her little pink birthday cake and I got all choked up just thinking about how much she's grown and how fast the last year went by.

I decided to make the cake myself for two reasons. First, I was feeling emotional and wanted the memory of making my daughter's first dessert for her from scratch. Second, I wanted to know exactly what was in the cake and I didn't want it to be too sweet. We were going to have a lot of people over and have a long party at our house, and finding out what my baby would be like full of sugar in a crowded room with possibly not enough sleep was not something I was interested in seeing.

I made a healthy, sugar free cake with banana and applesauce. Because for whatever reason I seem unable to make a recipe without changing something, I did put an egg in the cake and used some white flour as well as wheat flour. The cake tasted like muffins. Yummy, but not like traditional cake.

One of my favorite things about this cake was that it does not require the mixer. I only make cake if it is someone's birthday because I hate using the mixer!

I planned to make a sugar free frosting as well, but I really wanted the cake to be at least somewhat sweet, so I made this simple strawberry cream cheese frosting. I only made half a recipe and there was plenty left over. The frosting was absolutely delicious! I couldn't stop snacking on it.  I also loved the color and the little flecks in the frosting from the jam.

I used a mug to cut out four small layers from the two regular cake layers, stacked them up and frosted them. It was tricky... they wanted to slide around a lot. Typically I would have used toothpicks, but since this was a smash cake, that seemed like a bad idea. 

I frosted the cake the evening before the party and stowed it in the refrigerator. I touched it up the day of and it started to look much better. I used a little bit of pink sugar to make a "1" on top of the cake. 

My sweet little girl really enjoyed the frosting, but hardly touched the cake at all! She didn't make too much of a mess either.

So there it is. My simple, homemade, sweet-but-still-kind-of-healthy smash cake. It may not have been bakery-perfect, but my daughter loved it, and I enjoyed making it for her. We don't always have to strive for perfection. Usually something simple and heartfelt is enough.