We recently celebrated Bella's 4th birthday. I chose to skip buying from the grocery store and bakeries this year to focus on real food. It may not be in everyone's budget to pay for a specialty bakery to create a dye free artificial flavor free cake. There were some store bought cake mixes with cleaner ingredients, but I don't know how they taste and these were pretty easy and inexpensive to make. I made both of these ahead of time and froze them. I frosted them the morning of the party still frozen, and they were completely unthawed by mid afternoon.
Yellow Cake
2 2/3 c white flour (I used Azure Standard https://www.azurestandard.com/?a_aid=ce5ee4cb67)
2 sticks butter at room temp
2 tsp baking powder
1 c milk (I used unsweetened almond milk)
1 1/4 c sugar
1/2 tsp salt
4 eggs
2 T vanilla
about 1/4 c dye free sprinkles (about half a bottle of Kroger Simple Truth sprinkles)
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Beat butter and sugar with electric mixer. Add eggs one at a time. Slowly add in milk and vanilla, followed by flour/baking soda/salt. Do not overmix. Add sprinkles.
Add into oiled cake pans or lined cupcake tins. Bake cupcakes 16-22 minutes or 25-30 minutes for 8" pans. Let cool completely. You can freeze ahead of time and decorate the day of your party.
Chocolate Cake
1 c wheat flour
1 c white flour
1/2 c cocoa powder
4 tsp baking powder
1 1/4 c sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 c water (or coffee)
2 eggs
2/3 c coconut oil or softened butter
2 Tble vanilla
Mix water (or coffee), oil, sugar, oil and vanilla. I prefer using coffee to give it a richer taste. Separately, mix dry ingredients. Slowly mix wet and dry ingredients. Add to oiled cake pans or lined cupcake tins. Bake cupcakes 16-22 minutes or 25-30 minutes for an 8" cake pan.
I bought some frosting that didn't have tons of fake stuff in it, which required reading a lot of labels at the store. This frosting was pretty good actually. I also used some homemade strawberry jam in between the layers of the cake. You could add natural food dye to color the frosting, but I honestly forgot.
We decorated the cupcakes with sprinkles and the bottom of the cake with unreal candies, and topped it with a Unicorn cake topper.
These were a huge hit with both the kids and the parents, who were all appreciative. These cakes are still high in calories and not something to eat every day, but it gives us better options for special occasions.
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