1st Birthday Smash Cake Tutorial + Simple Vanilla Cake recipe
Celebrate your little one’s first birthday by making a fun and yummy smash cake! It’s easier than you might think to make one at home, especially with this simple vanilla cake recipe.
My precious girl turned one last weekend! I seriously cannot believe how fast the past year has gone by. It seems like it was just the other day that we were bringing her home from the hospital, and making a pit stop along the way to pick up a big box of hot malasadas to celebrate. 😉
Have you ever had a malasada before? I’d never had one until we moved out here to Hawaii. They are basically fried pieces of delicious sugary dough. Uh-mazing! But I digress…
We decided to keep her actual birthday pretty low key and just stayed at home to let her play with her new toys, which my son and I were SO excited about. Probably more than her. 😉
He was excited to have presents around to open and play with, and I was excited about GIRL presents! She got her first Cabbage Patch Doll, which I couldn’t wait to get for her since I loved mine when I was little.
Plus, Babyland General Hospital (where the Cabbage Patch Dolls are born) is just a little ways up the road from my hometown in Cleveland, Georgia. I’m SO looking forward to taking my kiddos there one day!
We are having a birthday party for her in a couple of weeks with a luau theme, since she’s our little Hawaiian-born baby.
I decided that I still wanted to do a little something special for her actual birthday, and I really wanted to try my hand at making her a smash cake. I had never made one before, and I had never really decorated a cake before either, aside from slapping on some icing with a spatula and going shake crazy with some sprinkles. 😉
I was ready to give it my best shot, though, and I ended up being pretty proud of my work! It actually isn’t that hard at all, and while my cake certainly isn’t anywhere near the quality of a professional’s, I was still very happy with it, and so was our little birthday girl.
How to make a Smash Cake
1. If you want to make a two layer smash cake (like I did), search your cabinets for two small, round, glass pyrex bowls. The ones I used were one quart each. You can use two small casserole dishes or other kinds of bowls as well, just so long as they are oven-safe! Grease and flour them both well.2. Prepare the Simple Vanilla Cake batter according to directions below. Fill each of the glass bowls about 3/4 the way full with batter. I used the remaining batter to make a dozen cupcakes as well. Bake and allow to cool completely. Once cool, loosen the cakes gently from the sides of the bowls by carefully running a knife around the outside edges. You will want to flatten out the tops of your cakes, which you can do by cutting a very thin layer off the top of each with a knife.
3. Prepare your frosting. I used my Vanilla Buttercream Frosting
recipe and added a little pink gel food coloring. Spread a thin layer on the top of one of your cakes, then turn the other cake upside down and place on top.
5. I covered mine in roses, which were DEFINITELY NOT perfect, but I was still really happy with it! Especially since it was my first attempt, I was okay with it not being perfect. Your baby is going to LOVE digging into their cake, and they are not going to care one little bit how fancy it’s decorated, so just HAVE FUN with it! If you want to make roses, take the tip of your icing bag, squirt and move in a circular motion, swirling around in a circle from the center. I covered the top of the cake in these swirls first before attempting the sides.
6. Continue covering the cake by with the same pattern down the sides. The sides were definitely more challenging for me! Just take your time, and remember how much your sweet baby is going to love it. 🙂 For any open spaces, I just gave a simple squirt of frosting to fill.
7. For the the little topper, I tied some baker’s twine around two paper straws (that came in a pack I bought from Target). I LOVE fun straws, and I was so excited that I had some turquoise ones since I decided to do her cake in a pink and turquoises theme. Next, cut out some small triangle shapes from scrapbook paper and tape them to the string, like I’ve shown below. I used three little triangles to spell out the word “one” but you could also make your baby’s name! My little girl’s name is pretty long, so I decided to stick with the word “one” instead. 🙂 I simply wrote the letters on the opposite side with a black sharpie, but you could also use letter stickers!
8. Carefully stick the two straws into your cake, pushing down until both are level and to your liking. Then stand back and admire your finished product!
And now you’re ready to snap some photos of your little one enjoying their special cake! Here’s one of our little princess:
I hope this helps you a bit if you’re interested in making a smash cake for a special little one in your life! It’s really not hard at all, and is actually a lot of fun! Like I said, mine is not perfect. My icing decorating skills could probably use some improvement, but overall I was happy with it.
If I can make one that looks somewhat decent, then I know y’all can, too!
Oh, and here’s the recipe for the simple vanilla cake! Enjoy. 🙂
Recipe: 1st Birthday Smash Cake Tutorial + Simple Vanilla Cake
Ingredients
- 2 cups granulated sugar
- 1 cup unsalted butter,, softened
- 4 eggs
- 2 Tablespoons vanilla extract
- 3 cups all-purpose flour, (could also be made with cake flour)
- 3 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 1/2 cups milk, (I used whole milk)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour baking pans, or line muffin tin with cupcake liners.
- Using an electric mixer, beat the sugar and butter together over medium speed for 5-8 minutes. Add in the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Stir in the vanilla.
- Combine the flour and baking powder in a medium sized bowl.
- Alternate adding the dry mixture and the milk to the batter, beginning and ending with the dry mixture. Beat until just combined.
- Pour mixture into prepared baking pans. See notes below for baking times.
- Once baking time is complete, transfer baking dishes to a wire rack to cool. Once completely cool, remove cakes from baking dishes and frost with Easy Buttercream Frosting and enjoy!
Notes
If you like this 1st Birthday Smash Cake Tutorial, then you might also like:
Pineapple Sunshine Cake
What color pink food coloring did you use? I did a sample cake and my pink just isn’t right! Other wise it turned out great!
Hi Jenny! I used a Wilton gel food coloring. I believe the color may have been Magenta but I only use a little bit. Hope that helps!
Could you tell me what size of rounded glass “pan” you used to make this cake please? It is so cute!
Hi Melanie, I used two Pyrex baking dishes, each one is 4 cups (1 quart) and measures a little less than 6 inches in diameter across the top. Hope that helps!
So cute. I love cake smash photo sessions. This smash cake was great.
Hello,
I stumbled on your blog, it’s gorgeous! I can’t wait to try your recipe for my next Smash the cake.
I’m not from the US. What size is a one quart pan exactly? Is it equivalent to a 6° circular pan ?
Hi there! I just did some conversions and 1 quart is equal to 946.35 milliliters. I know nothing about the metric system, so I hope that helps a bit! When I can find my measuring tape, I’ll measure the diameter of the bowl and let you know!
Perfect, thank you!
Does the cake need 2 tablespoons or 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract? 2 tablespoons seems like a lot so I wanted to clarify before making this. Thanks!
Hi Marie! It is 2 Tablespoons. I know it seems like a lot, but it gives it good vanilla flavor! Hope you enjoy it! 🙂
Hi Ashlyn,
I am from Germany and started looking online for a smash cake for my little daughter. I found your website and fell in love with your cake. I just need to get two things sorted before I can start – 1 for the cake: how much is 2 TB vanilla extract (I guess some kind of packages?) and 2 for the cream: what kind of shortening should I use? I get different translations for shortening which somehow mean similar things but are different. So, is it butter or lard (soft fat) or fat (en block). I’m so looking forward to making this beautiful cake and will link your recipe on facebook around my daughters birthday at the end of the month.
Kati
Hi Kati! For the vanilla extract, that would be 2 Tablespoons. Shortening is made from vegetable fat, so it’s a little bit different than lard which is animal fat. I actually have a new buttercream recipe that I’ve been meaning to post that doesn’t use shortening at all! I’ll go ahead and give that one to you because it might be easier! It’s 1 softened cup unsalted butter, 3 teaspoons vanilla extract, 4 cups powdered sugar, and 1-2 Tablespoons milk. You make it using the same method as my other frosting. Hope that helps and happy birthday to your little girl! 🙂
Thank you so much! I’ll keep you updated!
Love the smash cake for my granddaughter’so first birthday
For how long do you think I should bake it if I use 1/2 a quart pyrex? I am really excited to use your ideas for my baby’s 1 yr birthday coming up, but I only have the 1/2 pyrex!
Hi Nats! The 1/2 quart size wouldn’t need to bake as long as the 1 quart; I’d start checking at about 20 minutes and just keep an eye on them. Hope you have a fun time celebrating your little one’s first birthday!
Hi, sorry this may seem like a strange question but I’m just baking your beuitful cake now and think the oven may be too high, what temp would you recommend?
Hi Hayley, sorry, just now seeing your comment. I bake it at 350. Hope it turned out well!
Hey lady!!! I absolutely LOVED Caroline’s smash cake for her birthday! If Carter was a girl I would’ve totally replicated the entire thing. Since I had to make it a bit more boyish I didn’t use your decorating technique, but I did steal your cake and frosting recipes. They were DELICIOUS! I linked back to you on my new blog 🙂 http://thenotsoboredhousewife.com/?p=602
Loved the idea!! I tried your recipe and the cake came out very well. Thank you so much for the detailed tutorial and the tips you have shared!
Wonderful, Sonia! I’m so glad you enjoyed the recipe and that the instructions were helpful! Thank you for coming back to let me know! 🙂
Such a cute cake smash cake. I love the little banner too.
Thank you so much, Linda!
I know you’ve said here this is a lovely cake for a 1st birthday, but my 19 year old daughter has just walked in the room and seen it, said “awh, so cute, can I have that for my birthday?” It’d be ok for a 20th too right?!?
Of course, Julie! I think it would be perfect for any girly birthday, no matter how old we get! Thank you to you and your daughter for your sweet comments. Totally made my day. 😉
What a precious Birthday Girl and a beautiful cake, very special! Hope you have a great week and thanks so much for sharing your awesome recipe with Full Plate Thursday. Your post has been pinned with the party!
Come Back Soon!
Miz Helen
Thank you so much, Miz Helen! She had a great birthday for sure. 🙂
What a gorgeous cake! And your daughter is adorable!
Thank you so much, Michelle!
What a pretty cake! I wish I knew about smash cakes when my kids were younger. But I’ll definitely try using your decorating tip on a regular size cake. Thanks for sharing!
Thank you, Ritchil! And I know what you mean. I don’t remember smash cakes being such a big thing when my son was younger, so he never really had one either! Glad the icing tip helps though! 🙂
It’s hard to believe you’ve never really decorated a cake before. It looks great! I would’ve done the slap-on-the-icing-and-pour-the-sprinkles method ’cause I’m lazy. 🙂
Great job!
Oh the slapping on icing and pouring of sprinkles is how it usually goes, Ai! Thank you so much!