Mrs. Peter's Birthday Cake

A favorite book at camp was The Seven Silly Eaters by Mary Ann Hoberman. This delicious picture book tells of a rapidly growing family, a child a year and a set of twins until there are seven children, where each child will eat only one food: warm milk, homemade pink lemonade, applesauce, non-lumpy oatmeal, homemade bread, eggs fried, and eggs poached. As the mother approaches a nervous breakdown and her birthday, the children decide to make their favorite foods for her. They can't, end up with a big mess, some of which they hide in the warming oven, and in the morning a "pink and plump and perfect cake" is discovered. It turns out to be the one meal they can all agree to eat, and -- even better -- they can all help make.

I had to read this about three times a day. Monkey1 did admit, when I asked, that she was trying to memorize it. Monkey2 insisted I write down all the ingredients so we could make this cake. 

So we tried for the occasion of Monkey3's five-month birthday. (This first year, she gets a birthday every month.) Referencing my best baking recipe, I included everything in the story and served it hot out of the oven. So hot in fact that the candles melted. So then I had to cut holes in the cake so we would not eat the wax. But with ice cream on top, the Monkeys thought it was delicious. However, I was puzzled that it had not risen at all. I got the pink part, red sugar added to the lemon juice for the pink lemonade, but not the plump part. My husband pointed out that the "quick bread" recipe I was working off of used baking soda and baking powder to rise, but this had been rendered useless by the acid of the lemons. So next time I'll have to try my luck with yeast for achieving that "pink and plump and perfect cake."