Smash Cake Prototype

For the babies' first birthday (which is only a week from today - eek!), I want to make their smash cakes.  I won't be making the mix from scratch.  Or at least I'm not planning on making the mix from scratch right now, but you never know.

We borrowed a small round cake pan from a friend, and I made the first prototype cakes last night.  Today, I tried my hand at icing - piping and everything, which I've never done before.  I think it actually turned out kind of cute!  Note that this is not the design for their actual cake.  I just wanted to practice with the piping and the different tips and stuff.  So this is a kind of cake decorating "sampler," if you will.

This evening, we decided that we really needed to test our prototype.  Jason volunteered to be my test baby.  He really put a lot of effort into making this an authentic test.  I have to admit that I was surprised.

Wearing the perfect bib.

A bit apprehensive at first.

The "nose" test.  The icing was still a bit too firm from being refrigerated.

Then he really dug in!

I think he likes it!!

Unfortunately, we discovered that our test was flawed.  I pulled the cake right out of the refrigerator before he smashed it.  This resulted in icing that was still more firm than it will be at the party (where the cakes will have set out for about an hour).  In our test plan for prototype #2, we will let the cake sit at room temperature before smashing.  To be continued...