Birthday Baking
March 3rd, 2006 Caroline
Ben turns four tomorrow and, because he is my son, we have been discussing the birthday party menu for a couple of weeks now. At one point, he was lobbying for an all-blueberry menu (blueberry cupcakes, blueberry muffins, blueberry cake, blueberry madeleines), but I have managed to redirect him somewhat. Currently (and I hope this doesn’t change much in the next 12 hours), we’re planning to serve tofu dogs, peanut butter and jam sandwiches (though Ben, a good friend and gracious host, reminded me last night to use sunflower seed butter for M, who might be allergic to peanuts, and “creeeeamy” peanut butter for S, who doesn’t like peanut butter with “seeds”) and carrot sticks.
Then, for dessert! Chocolate and vanilla cupcakes. I’m planning to make a bunch of cream cheese frosting, dye it different colors and put it into small ziploc bags to let the kids frost their own cupcakes, and set out various toppings (blueberries, chocolate chips, sprinkles, jimmies and the like) to let the kids decorate them, too. We’re hoping for a sunny day so that they can make this mess on the picnic table outside.
I also made blueberry madeleines, but he doesn’t know this yet. The recipe, from Joy of Cooking, is kind of a nuisance, insisting that you cream the butter by hand (and I do! because if Irma tells me to do something, I obey!), then let the batter rest for half an hour before baking. Of course that direction is buried in the text, so even though I’ve made these once before, for Ben’s birthday last year, I forget about the resting and the oven has been up at 450 for a good hour before the cookies go in it. But Ben loves them, and he only asks for them on his birthday, and they are particularly delicious. All that butter, painstakingly creamed by hand, no doubt.
The cupcakes and madeleines are for the lunchtime party, so of course we also need a dinner-time birthday cake. Ben and I made that together this morning, Nigella Lawson’s old-fashioned birthday cake. It’s not my very favorite chocolate layer cake, but it’s about the easiest (dump all the ingrediants into the food processor, dump batter into pan, bake) and it tastes just fine.
Entry Filed under: General
2 Comments
1. Libby | March 3rd, 2006 at 7:21 pm
We did the decorate-your-own cupcakes more than once for Mariah, I think–weren’t you even here for it once? It’s a big hit, though messy. There are always kids who only like frosting, and others who don’t like it at all, so it’s a good way to make veryone happy.
2. mom | March 4th, 2006 at 5:19 am
I certainly was on hand for what I think was Mariah’s first birthday party after you moved to your current home: was she 5 then? And there was one child who was pretty well covered in frosting, and a ‘naked’ cupcake left on the plate in front of her. Hope your weather cooperates!