Pink Ladybug Cake

Running with the party theme, I needed to master the cake.

Now, I have baked a lot of cakes in my time, but never had I attempted one in a bowl. So, I felt I should do a trial run. I am glad I did.

The hubby's birthday happens to be right before Little's, so he was wonderful enough to let me practice for his.

I simply used a boxed mix that Little picked out.
I almost always substitute applesauce for oil in cakes and brownies, with GREAT results, so I did just that.
I put the prepared cake mix in an ovensafe Pyrex bowl.
I used a little extra in a tiny pyrex bowl to make a "cupcake" size...(for the head)
As I learned, because of the depth, it really has to OVERcook. It cooked for 1 hour and 5 minutes.

In the meantime, I made the frosting. Pink buttercream, and Chocolate buttercream for the "black". I used a grass tip for the pink body, and a dot tip for the head.

I needed to play with how to put the cake together as well as how to I wanted to frost it.


Here is the finished product.

Those are smarties for the eyes...
Pipecleaners for the antenna,**(I wrapped the bottom in masking tape, so as NOT to get any fuzzies inside the cake.)

It turned out GREAT!
However, what I learned is that I don't think a cake that has to be cooked that long, can hold up to the applesauce substitution...it turned out very dry. I think it was going to be dry either way...but with applesauce it was almost too dry. Beautiful, but dense and dry!

After the experiment, Little decided she wanted cupcakes instead...hmmmmmm...
Back to square one. :)

He is such a good daddy!


Raelyn