Last week was my nephew's 1st birthday! They had a party for him on Saturday, & asked me to make him a birthday cake. It was to be a smash cake, which means it's small & all for him to do with as he liked. I knew immediately that I wanted to make him one with the monkey design that I saw awhile ago on Smitten Kitchen. His mom asked for chocolate on chocolate, so it was perfect!
When we got to the party, I showed him the cake & he immediately wanted to stick his hands in it. Smart boy! :-) I used a chocolate zucchini loaf cake recipe from Summer Harms. At least that way he got in a few veggies!
Instead of baking it in a loaf pan, I used two 8" round pans. It was about 1.5" thick, the perfect height to make a small cake with. I drew the monkey head shape with a toothpick on one of the rounds, then cut it out. I put the cut piece on top of the other cake round & used it as the pattern for the second layer.
I think his favorite part was the icing. I made my usual chocolate peanut butter icing. I waited to add the cocoa powder so that I could take out a bit of plain peanut butter icing for the face. Then I mixed in the cocoa powder & iced the whole cake. I put it in the fridge for a few hours, then used a plastic bag to pipe on the icing for the face.
He seemed to like the texture of the icing. It took him awhile to really dig in & get down to the cake, but once he did...what a mess!!
Happy 1st Birthday!
That cake is adorable! Plus, way to be sneaky with those veggies... ;)
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