Strawberry Cake with Toddlers

My best friend's birthday was last month, and I told her that I was going to make her a cake.  Well, I was on call the Saturday before so I knew I wouldn't have time to make it the next day...which meant I needed to make it pre-call.  D brought K over and she helped me make the cake. It was quite fun.  We all donned our aprons and baked away.

There were a couple of times when K got really excited.  First was when we put the first egg in...the batter became BRIGHT red!  WOW!

Then when I put the eggs in...she SO wanted to crack them on her own.  I let her help crack the eggs but did have to go fishing after a couple of shell pieces before we added it to the batter, but I think it's important to let kids help as much as they can.

Then came the sifting...she helped and thought that was pretty neat.

I made two layers and four small cupcakes for K.  I think her favorite part of the day was licking the spoon!

 Sunday night after we went to my friend Katie's house, I came back and made the icing.  It wasn't quite as thick as I would have liked but ended up making a pretty cake.

Strawberry Cake adapted from allrecipes.com
2 cups sugar
1 package strawberry jello (I used sugar free...when you make baked good that already have sugar, don't need the extra sugar from the jello)
1cup oil
4 eggs
2 3/4 cups sifted cake flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 cup milk (I used buttermilk)
1 tablespoon vanilla
1/2 cup strawberry puree (thawed frozen strawberries blended in the food processor)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Spray 2 9-inch round cake pans with Pam with flour (splurged on this when it was on sale and LOVE it!).

In a large bowl, blend oil, sugar, and jello.  Add the eggs one at a time, blending after each egg.  Sift together the flour and baking powder.  Starting and ending with the flour mixture, add flour and milk alternately to the batter.  Blend in vanilla and puree.  Pour the batter evenly into the prepared pans.  Place the pans in the oven and bake for 25-30 minutes or until a knife comes out clean when inserted into the center.  Allow to cool for at least 10 minutes before removing from the pans.

Strawberry Icing
1 cup pureed strawberries
1/2 cup (1 stick) softened butter
3-4 cups powdered sugar

In a food processor, puree strawberries.  Add the softened butter and blend.  Then pour in the sugar until reaches desired consistency.  Place one cake layer on serving dish.  Spread icing over that layer.  Top with the remaining cake layer.  Then spread icing over the top and down the sides of the cake until all sides are covered.  Top with a sliced strawberry.  Enjoy!

(sorry for the poor quality...taken by cell phone at work!)