Sunday 6 March 2011

Baking special edition: Free cakes for kids - Spongebob

I have recently become involved with an organisation called Free cakes for kids; an idea which came over from the states, there are now a number of groups in the UK, including in Oxford. As it says on the website:

"Free cakes for kids is a community service to families who find it difficult to provide a birthday cake for their child. The cakes are baked by volunteers from your community – with your kid’s favourite theme or style. The service is free, friendly and confidential"

They also organise community baking sessions, which I am hoping to be involved with.

But I got asked to make my first cake for this weekend (bakers donate time and the ingredients); I was told that the birthday child was a four year old girl and had visions of making something pink and sparkly. When I rang up her Mum to ask what she would like, I was told that her favourite thing were the Zingzillas. Not having heard of them (though I have subsequently found that they are quite cute, although possibly difficult to make out of cake), I asked what else she liked, and her Mum said Spongebob. "Well", I thought to myself "at least Spongebob is square (for those of you who don't know - and I didn't - until K enlightened me, Spongebob is a sponge who lives at the bottom of the sea and goes on adventures with his friend the starfish). I spent most of the week agonising about how to do it, looking for pictures on the internet, and then in my cake decorating magazine I saw a picture of a Spongebob that someone else had made. And here is my version!

I am seriously proud of this as have never made anything like it before! I gave it to the little girl's Dad and he was impressed that anyone would make a cake, and I really hope that the little girl likes it.

I still managed to bake from the cupboards - I used drinking chocolate from our Christmas hamper to make the chocolate cake and the buttercream, I used writing icing and blue food colouring from my cupboards, and the only thing I bought was a packet of yellow sugarpaste for £1.95.

11 comments:

  1. Wow -- that is REALLY impressive! I can frost cakes pretty well (I worked in some restaurants so I got pretty good at it) -- but that was before gum paste and Cake Boss and all the cake competitions. I could never have created anything that good! Wow!

    I'm sure that was the highlight of the birthday. Well done!

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  2. Wow! That is great.

    I am off to check the website out as well, sounds like it could channel my baking skills for a purpose other than me eating my efforts!

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  3. You are just so darn talented. I would love to see you create your own cookbook. I really would. Now that is what you could do this week!

    The cake is gorgeous and I am sure she will love it. Can I put my birthday cake order in now as it is a big birthday this year! LOL

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  4. That sounds like a brilliant project Verity - I'm really impressed with your cake too.

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  5. That is a beautiful cake and such a lovely gesture, Verity!

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  6. What a wonderful combination of talented, generous bakers and the great idea to fulfill a need for baked cakes that most of us take for granted. I will hop on over to the website to find out a bit more, but, just wanted to say well done!

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  7. Too cute! Susan E

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  8. What a great cause, and such an amazing looking cake!

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  9. Wow- that is a really good cake! What a fantastic idea too!

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  10. That is seriously an impressive cake!

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  11. I really love this cake of SpongeBob Square Pants. My daughter loves watching him on Nickelodeon. We subscribe to DISH Network and sue DISH Online which allows us to watch our favorite episodes of him right on our computer. As a DISH employee I can tell you that we can even watch live TV content. Go to www.dishnetwork.com for more info.

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