Dessert Ideas for My Son's First Birthday Party!

Kids love the hobo s'mores--marshmallow on a stick. You take a can of chocolate icing and put in the microwave for 30 seconds. Then you place a marshmallow on a stick (popsicle or lollipop) and dip it in the frosting, then you can roll it in mini chocolate chips, crushed graham crackers, sprinkles, etc. Once I bought a small flower pot and florist foam and made a little "plant" out of the flowers. Or if you're pressed for time before the party, you can make a little "hobo s'more bar" and let the kids do it themselves--if you don't mind the mess.

Kids always love rice crispy treats. I know, they don't have the "wow" factor. But you can put sprinkles or drizzle chocolate or caramel on them or make them out of coco crispies to do something a little different.

And the "sundae bar" always goes over big with the kids.

Good luck!

J.,
Try this site: http://www.bettycrocker.com/entertaining/birthday-parties/

Even if you don't find anything in the birthday parties section, I've always found very yummy treats on this site. The easy pineapple upsidedown cake is one that ALL of my guests have raved about - maybe that is something you could make 'mini's of??? Good luck. ~ K.

I love these - you can have the kid decorate their own

http://cgi.ebay.com/Williams-Sonoma-Kids-Backyard-Bugs-Ca...

J. ~ I love baking and entertaining too. I found some very unique cake ideas on this web site: http://www.coolest-birthday-cakes.com/ Check it out!
I hope you have great weather for your party and find something fun to make :) Happy Birthday to your little guy.

~ L.

One dessert idea that boys ABSOLUTELY LOVE is "Dirt Cups". If you go on Jello's website, there is a recipe for it. Basically it looks like mud w/ worms in it(chocolate pudding & crushed Oreo cookies w/ gummy worms working through the pudding & hanging over the top). I know it sounds disgusting, but if you think like your son, he'll probably think that's the coolest thing in the world. Added bonus: it's CHEAP!!! Hope this helps!

I used ice cream cones and put cake batter in them. Baked them at the same temperature as I would the cake then frosted them to look like ice cream cones. The kids love them and they are easy to hold. Didn't make much of a mess either.
Hope this helps you out some.
Good luck to you.

Have you ever seen the little cheeseburger desert cookies? The bun is made of 2 vanilla wafers. The burger is chocolate frosting. Then dye a bit of cream cheese or white frosting yellow & red for the ketchup & mustard. Then dye some coconut shreds green for lettuce (shake them in a ziploc bag with just a teenie bit of green food color). Assemble them all like a mini cheeseburger. Then with your finger or a pastry brush lightly dab the tops of the "buns" with water and sprinkle on some sesame seeds. They're great and they look so neat. Kids and adults all love them, and it would be perfect for your "mini" desserts. Other minis that everyone loves are those peanut butter cookies with the Hershey kiss in the middle. Another way to make something similar is to press sugar cookie (or any) dough down into cups into mini muffin pans. Bake them like you'd bake cookies, but in the end, melt a little spoonful of milk chocolate chips in the centers and they're like little fudge cups. You can do the same with brownies. Make mini sandwich cookies with frosting in the middle. Make anything in a small size and set them out on a tiered desert platter or individual serving trays. You can have so much fun with minis. Good luck!

How about personal cheesecakes, use your regular cheesecake recipe and you can cheat and use a shortbread cookie for the crust and bake them in muffin tins with cute little birthday liners. I do the cheesecakes with gluten free cookies and they are one of my most requested desserts. I usually get about 24-36 cheesecakes out of a standard recipe. I also like using the store bought phyllo shells (you can find them in the freezer section next to the phyllo dough sheets I think the brand is Athens) and then I fill them with homemade strawberry mousse or custard. They look very fancy, but are so simple. Chocolate dipped strawberries are always a big hit. Or some mini tarts.

Happy Birthday to your little man! Have a great party!

MarthaStewart.com is AWESOME for this stuff, especially on a theme. We did a 'little monster' theme, and had dozens of things to choose from there.

Otherwise allrecipes.com, and the food network site are both good foe something tasty that you can get artsy with.

What about those upside-down cupcake, clown face things? Do people still make those? I always liked them.

Good luck!

I was just at a party recently where someone brought covered marshmellows on sticks. They had dipped or drizzled the marshemellows in chocolate, some caramel and then covered some with nuts, sprinkles, heath, etc.... The kids loved them because they were so easy to take and eat and all of the parents thought it was a great idea. THey also were very impressive looking on the plate. They were an eye catcher.

Hope your party goes well!

Try making Jello Cake.It's delicious and light !Kids love it ! Bake a white cake in 8x13 pan. After it is cooled poke holes in it with a big meat fork so the holes are about a half of an inch apart. Make jello (small box any flavor) following directions on box (don't put in fridge). Pour in holes using a table spoon or larger going over each hole two or three time but not more or it will be too soggy. When finished chill in fridge overnight. Use pan with plastic lid.The next morning or at least 6 - 8 hours later make and put on frosting.
Frosting
1 vanilla pudding (small box)
1 small cool whip

Make pudding using pie instructions on box. Fold in cool whip . Pour over cake and return to fridge.Enjoy!

Have a great party!

A friend of mine did little bugs for her son -- kind of a long the same lines as what you're talking about.
Judging by her pictures, it looked like she made an angel food cake & then used cookie cutters to cut out the bugs, then frosted them to look like a lady bug, dragonfly, etc. Then for goodie bags, she did paper mache bug catchers with stickers and stuff for the kids.

I'm not nearly as creative as that! For my son's birthday, we did an ice cream social w/ all the goodies -- homemade brownies, chips ahoy cookies, sprinkles, candies, whipped cream, cherries & nuts. It was a bigger hit with the adults than the kids! And, with a June birthday, everyone loved all the ice cream!

I have the BEST recipe for Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough brownies. I was "known" for bringing them to my work(when I worked). E-mail me if you are interested and want the recipe!

L.

Hey J.,
I know you like to bake, but I went to Sam's Club and they had little cupcakes made into an Elmo cake it was so cute and relatively inexpensive. You don't have to worry about trying to cut a cake or any other dessert. Hope this helps.

B.

Hi J.,
I like making mini hamburger cookies out out vanilla wafers and thin mint cookies. the wafer is the buns and the mint cookie is the hamburger then I color vanilla icing red,green,yellow for mustard,lettuce and ketchup. both kids and adults love them.
also try going on family fun.com there us a lot of ideas there.
hope this helped.

L.

Hi,

There are so many things you can do. You can do an ice cream sundae bar, ice cream cake (I bought that Betty Crocker mold that you can put ice cream, fruit or pudding in the middle), you can do cupcakes and frost them all to look like a cake. My family loves italian pastries so many times I do mini cupcakes for the kids and pastries for the adults. My sister in law's kids love pie so she has an array of different pies. Let us know what you decided.

Have you ever read Family Fun magazine? It's awesome - so many great ides that might be up your alley. You can also check out their website. They have really great and easy to make ideas for not only cakes, but party themes as well.

Congrats to you - I am all about letting my favorite bakery do the work!

I took and made a cake mix and baked it in small loaf pans. I then took blue icing and made "waves" all over the cake. Next, using teddy grams I used the tube icing and made swim suits for them. For the beach I used gram cracker crumbs. It made a cute and easy cake for my son's party.

My daughter's birthday is in Aug. and we would make strawberry shortcakes with fresh berries and real whipped cream. Any kind of fruit cobbler is good too. Aug. is too hot for cake.

I love making my "ice cream cone cupcakes." They are perfect for a summer party and can be decorated and dyed different colors to look just like it's ice cream cone cousin. They are so easy and the kids love them!

For the really little guys I made "baby trail mix" at my daughter's first birthday. I put Cheerios, dried fruit, yogurt drops (from Gerber), and fruit puffs in cute little treat cups (they got to keep as a party favor). The kids loved it and the parents were happy that they snack was healthy!

I've seen some really cute cakes cut and decorated at parties I've attended, including a train of several cars, caterpillars and snakes, and using cupcakes to create a caterpillar. (I've also seen using cupcakes to create flowers for girls.) I've also seen the "garden flower pot" suggestion someone already mentioned.

For other desserts to have on hand, I highly recommend oatmeal bars -- you can add fruit, chocolate chips, etc. and everyone always loves them. (If you use apples, it's like apple crisp in a bar.) I also make homemade "Peppermint patties." If you'd like the recipe, just email me. They're easy to make except the chocolate coating can be a bit messy.

And for kids, I had one friend who had the kids make their own bunny faces to eat. She had individual packs of applesauce, and the kids used raisins, M&Ms and bran cereal to create faces.

Good luck, and I hope you'll let us know what you decide to do!

J.,
I sell Pampered Chef and I have some great recipes for triffles, mini cakes in the micorwave that are awesome and even tuxedo brownies. If you are interested in any of those recipes send a line back with your personal eamil and I will forward those to you.
L.

I went to a one year old b-day party last weekend. They had a cake with the little guy's picture on it and lots of small desserts. They also had a separate cake for the birthday boy. It was about 4-6" round and from the same store as the main cake. They stripped him down to a pair of shorts and a bib, sang happy birthday with the small cake and let him eat it on his own. He was covered in blue frosting and chocolate cake. He had a blast and ended up looking like a member of the blue man group. The pictures are going to be great. His mom took him in for a quick bath when he was done.

I've done a ice cream sundae bar for parties with lots of kids. Get several toppings, sprinkles, whip cream and gummy bears/worms and the kids make their own.

hey J., have you seen the commercials for the pancake puffs? it's a pan that will take any batter and make round puffs of whatever-and you can fill them with fruit, chocolate, jam, whatever as well-for the adults of course! you can look online, but I also saw one of my local targets with them on one of their endcaps. good luck

I saw a cute picture the other day- It was an ice cream cone with the rim dipped in white chocolate, and filled with fresh fruit. Happy First!

bake cake batter in ice cream cones then let them decorate them

I didn't make it, but I got a combination cake/cupcake tower for my daughter's birthday. It was a round cake frosted plain white and then had 18 decorated cupcakes piled on top. The bakery frosted the cupcakes in yellow, pink and purple and then some were decorated with small fabric butterflies. They also put icing "dots" that matched the three different colors of cupcake frosting on the round portion of the cake.

I've seen everyone mention cupcakes in cones, but I have also seen ice cream clowns. Basically, you use a scoop of ice cream (maybe use a doily or coffee filter so they can be passed around individually) and then put a sugar cone on top like a clown hat. Decorate to suit and you're done.

Hi,

For my daughters birthday i made ice cream cone cupcakes. They were a big hit especially for the kids. The adults loved them too!!! All you need to get is a box of the colorful ice cream cones, a box of the philsbury confetti cake(depending on how many people) and the frosting otherwise make your own frosting. But very simple and easy. Just pour the batter in the cone, but not all the way to the top because then they will over flow when baking and just bake them like you would the cake. Time wise you need to just keep an eye on them till the cake gets a little brown on top. Maybe 15-20 min if that. They are delicious!!! Hope you enjoy if you choose to make them.

What I did for my daughter's 1st birthday was make a cake from one of the Wilton character pans. It was my first time and I did a trial run and it wasn't as hard as I thought. Everyone was amazed at how much it looked like Elmo and I have done it for her for every birthday ever since. As for mini desserts, I like to do the mini cupcakes for the little ones, they always seem to like it.

I will try jello Jigger or pudding faces like clowns

Edible Dirt

Oreo cookie crumbs and chocolate pudding or cool whip mixed together. Put it in little flower pots from an arts and crafts store, add some gummi worms and voila the kids can eat "dirt"!

You can also get really creative with adding plastic flowers to the pots or put it in a casserole dish and add some green frosting (grass) and plastic flowers and gummi worms and make a whole backyard dirt scene!

The kids will LOVE it, and so will the adults!

J. one I used to do for my Mom that always brought on Wow's same as the jello cake mentioned earlier, but bake an angel food cake, use fruity jello's and after you frost it with the cool whip frosting decorate it with lots of flowers made from thin slices of orange and strawberries. Definately an adult cake very light fruity, delicious and beautiful. If you are having kids who are old enough to appreciate your work try doing a castle.Just design it with different size pans as a base and then use ice cream cones as towers. Frost the whole thing blue then decorate with candies on and around.

I recently saw an item in a catalog for ice cream cone cupcake pans where the cupcakes look like ice cream cones and the frosting is the "icecream"