Arlo is obsessed with ham, it’s one of his favourite words and definitely his favourite food! So I had considered making a birthday cake in the shape of a pig… however given my husband’s recent conversion to vegetarianism I thought this might be a little inappropriate.
So I opted for Arlo’s other obsession – tractors!
My friend bought me this brilliant book full of novelty cake ideas for children, so I dusted off the cover and found some inspiration. I have to say at this point that I was quite terrified by the prospect of trying to make a cake look like anything other than, well, a cake. This is why I make cupcakes – you just make them look pretty or fun, they don’t have to resemble anything in particular.
How many birthday parties have you been to where you have to politely congratulate the parent for making their child’s cake, but have NO clue what it’s meant to be?!
Well as we weren’t inviting anyone round apart from family I thought this was probably the safest time to have a try. Besides, Arlo’s only two and has a limited vocabulary so couldn’t insult it.
It’s a bit wonky and looks more like those dozy tractors out of Disney Pixar film Cars that keep getting tipped over, but I was nevertheless fairly proud of my creation.
It was basically made up of a huge rectangle of sponge cake which I cut up into various sized building blocks to get my basic shape. Cup cakes were used for the wheels and a whole lot of butter cream used to coat it all. The best bit was creating the soil for the tractor to sit on – grated chocolate. I enjoyed asking people, “Would you like some soil with your cake?”.
Arlo had a fabulous day opening pressies, playing musical statues and pass the parcel. I really can’t believe my little mega-man is two years old!
U are so cool! I really love ur posts! Hope the new vegetarian adventures for ur hubs will be cool too!!
Thanks v much! Cool!
Love it! Its brilliant. E x
Thanks Ele – wasn’t convinced to start with but it grew on me!
Good job on the tractor Katie! I bet Arlo thought it was great too. I used to love making the birthday cakes for my two – but I always made a point of telling the guests what the cake was meant to be ( cos I knew the mums would quiz them when they got home!).
You’ll have to bring Arlo down for a sit on R’s old tractor when you’re up in Shropshire next.
Oh wow Jan Arlo would LOVE that!!!!
Wow!what a super cake, no mistaking what it was meant to be!what a shame you had to cut it up.I love the wheels.
The wheels worked well and were the first bits to be eaten!
Hey katie go sell it to John Deere!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I’ll get on to their PR…. 😉
I love it petal! Really, really good job and it’s not wonky, it’s just sitting on uneven ground 😉
Thanks Sian 🙂