I promised to share the 3 catastrophic events that effected my son’s 1st birthday cake today. Looking back I can definitely find the entertainment value in these events. At the time it wasn’t quite as funny!
Be sure to read them all. The 3rd one is a doozie!!
1. The cake itself
My first attempt at making 1 of the 4 layers of cake fell. Like fell completely flat in the middle. It made for a great taste test, but happy I was not. Its because of potential events like this that I do my baking in advance so luckily I had plenty of time to reattempt. My 2nd cake came out perfect, if I do say so myself.
The cake actually is a two part story. The recipe calls for pudding mix which makes it really spongy (and yummy!) so layering the cakes turned out to be a bit of a disaster…
Let us call it the leaning tower of cake.
Even with 5 skewers inside it would not hold straight. Luckily it seemed to be holding up, if not slightly askew.
After passing out slices to the party guests, we had about half the cake left. We all walked away to eat it then open birthday gifts. In the meantime the cake, oh my lovely cake, fell over.
Yep, the top 3 layers slid right off. They did land on the cake plate so for that I was grateful.
And apparently my lovely family secretly tried to fix it back upright to save my ego, but the cake was having none of that and fell again. 🙂
2. The icing
Never ever again will I do a cream cheese icing on a birthday cake.
It was absolutely scrumptious and totally made the cake, but was so runny that I had no control over where it went on the cake! If you look at the picture of it, do you see those sprinkles around the sides at the top? They didn’t start out there. The icing ran!
And those ridges along the cake? Those are the cake layers where the icing ran over them trying desperately to get to the bottom of the plate.
Now you might not think my cake is so pretty now that you know it secrets. 😉
3. My dog ate it
No seriously, my dog at the cake.
Remember I said the cake fell? Well the cake plate was near the edge of the table, and I didn’t feel like cleaning it up right away so it sat there for a little while. In the meantime, one of my sneaky little dogs snuck in the kitchen after all of the guests had left and ate at least half of the cake that had fallen over!! I of course had the throw the rest of what fell away. We still had that bottom layer that was untouched to snack on.
And my dog had a seriously tummy ache around 4am…
Jessica @ Sunny Tuesday says
March 31, 2012 at 9:28 PMOh my gosh, I am cracking up! Pretty much every baking attempt by me is a fail. I already ordered Ellie’s cake for her party. lol
Beverly {Flamingo Toes} says
March 31, 2012 at 9:20 PMOh my gosh – awesome stories!! The cake looked yummy though!
My only story was with a store bought cake (I wasn’t as ambitious when the kids where little haha) and my son’s 7th birthday. I picked up the sheet cake so he could blow out the candles while we were all singing. And tipped it just a little.
The base they set the sheet cakes on is pretty slippery – and the whole thing flipped right over onto the ground. Poor kid haha.
Jocelyn says
March 31, 2012 at 9:00 PMI love that you shared all the cake “oops”!!! No matter what happened it sure looks super tasty. And the sprinkles that are sliding off…I seriously thought you made it like that:-) Off the top of my head I can’t think of any catastrophes…lots of things sticking or not baking right though!!!
Truly Myrtle says
March 31, 2012 at 2:40 PMStill – the photos are fab!
My most recent disaster was when the carefully prepared gluten and dairy free cake I made for my intolerant (of gluten and dairy that is!) friend slipped straight of the platter as I turned precariously to do something else at the same time….and landed splat, in many many many pieces on the floor 🙁
I regularly have the sloppy icing problem…
Lynette P says
March 31, 2012 at 1:13 PMWell the cake is gorgeous – and the sprinkles down the side look sweet. Will you share the recipe? I looked all over your pinterest and didn’t see it (SHOCKED I was!). I’ve been making 3 layer cakes lately – I have great respect for a woman who would attempt a 4 layer!
My most recent baking disaster was an apricot nectar cake in a bundt pan (my family’s favorite). I was making it to take to a sick friend, so I was going to put it on a disposable platter so they didn’t have to worry about getting it back to me. Well, it was perfect and yummy smelling and my family was standing behind me with covetous eyes because they knew it wasn’t for them. I flipped the cake over to the platter (in my hand) and the platter collapsed and the cake fell a foot to the counter and burst open with steam coming up out of its warm center. I yelled (an expletive) and what did they do? Ran over and started reaching around me to get chunks of the cake off the counter to eat.
Michele {The Scrap Shoppe} says
April 2, 2012 at 10:38 PMYou can find the recipe here!
Dee in N.H. says
March 31, 2012 at 11:47 AMROTFL! Loved the story of “The Cake”. I leave the baking to you experts since most of my baking stories are also disaster stories!
Angelica says
March 31, 2012 at 11:39 AMOnce when I made all from scratch cupcakes I took them to work. A male coworker told me they were terrible! Luckily he was a close friend and honest so I knew he wasn’t just being a meanie, but still I was so embarrassed. That was years ago so hopefully now I am a better baker…
Ellen Stewart (aka Ellie/El/e/Mrs. Seaman) says
March 31, 2012 at 11:03 AMNothing catastrophic, but just a whole lot of ugly.
The orange bundt that would come out of my well used (and always up to that cake) successful bundt pan.
My muffins for staff treat day that wouldn’t let go of the cute paper. (I redid them without liners.)
The “egg” shaped sugar cookies that were just yellow and purple blobs two Easters ago.
Ug.
Lee.