This past weekend, I had the privilege of making a birthday cake for my best friend’s little boy. He’s about the same age as my little Zoe, they all have a great time playing together. He asked for a ‘digger cake’ for his birthday. There is a lot of inspiration around the web for this kind cake. I didn’t have a written out plan when I started decorating, it kind of came together as I went along.
This is what I did:
I made two 9×13 chocolate cakes. One of them makes the bottom layer of the cake above, then I covered it in chocolate buttercream frosting. I took the second cake and cut it into pieces, I stacked them to make the different levels. I used the other chocolate frosting, but I did leave some of the ends unfrosted.
The sand is made of graham cracker crumbs and the dirt is chocolate animal cracker crumbs. The milk chocolate rocks added to the character of the cake, they were from Walmart and they were hiding on the bottom shelf. The construction vehicles were also from Walmart, they came in a pack of 5.
The cake pictured at the top of this post was a 9 inch round cake frosted in vanilla buttercream frosting. I also made cupcakes which I garnished with a little ‘dirt’ and ‘sand’ and also a ‘rock’.
The birthday boy was thrilled with his cake. He said, “Thank you for the digger cake, Becca. It is awesome!” So I was excited that he loved it.
Chocolate Buttercream Frosting
2 sticks BUTTER, softened
3 1/2 cups POWDERED SUGAR
1/2 cup COCOA POWDER
1/4 teaspoon SALT
2 teaspoon VANILLA EXTRACT
4 Tablespoons MILK
Cream butter for a few minutes on medium speed.
Turn off mixer and sift powdered sugar and cocoa powder into the bowl.
Turn the mixer on low and mix at low speed until combined.
Add remaining ingredients and mix on medium speed for about 3 minutes.
Recipe Source for Frosting: Slightly adapted from Savory Sweet Life
This post is linked to Melt in Your Mouth Monday, Recipe Sharing Monday, These Chicks Cooked, What I Whipped Up Wed, Cast Party Wed, Nap Time Creations’ Tasty Tuesday Party, Crafts for Under Twenty Somethings, Will Craft for…Comments
How adorable! My son is 21 now, but when he was 3 until about age 6 or 7 he loved anything to do with construction or big machines. He would have loved this cake! It’s funny how a cake that I can’t taste or smell brings back such wonderful memories. Thanks for that! I saw your post on Melt in Your Mouth Monday!
LOVE THIS!!! My husband, father in law and some of our friends just redid the back yard.. I think I will make this as a thank you gift!
Thank you so much for sharing this at Recipe Sharing Monday. I hope to see you back tomorrow 🙂
wow, sooo adorable! What boy wouldn’t go crazy over this!!!! Would love it if you came and shared this recipe with us at Tasty Tuesday! http://nap-timecreations.blogspot.com/2011/08/summer-corn-salad-and-tasty-tuesday.html
love you blog title by the way! Thank you for linking up to Tasty Tuesday at Nap-Time Creations. I really hope you can come back and link up again this week! http://nap-timecreations.blogspot.com/
So fun! The cake is a work of art and I bet the boys loved eating the chocolate rocks.