One Smart Little Cookie: Cooking Mama Birthday Party

My daughter's have always asked to have princess parties to celebrate their birthdays with their friends and that is what I have been used to putting together and throwing for them. This year my 8-years-old daughter asked to have a Cooking Mama party. I was going between feelings of sadness that for the first time ever in our family, The Disney Princesses weren't going to make their annual debut; and a little excited to plan something completely different. I first googled "Cooking Mama Birthday Party"...nothing came up on the internet. I couldn't believe the theme was nowhere in the realms of "internet space"! Apparently, Cooking Mama is part of the Wild Frontier of birthday parties. So, to my birthday party planning board I went and this is what I put together for her.

Hamburger Cake

I usually bake from scratch because that's what I enjoy doing. But with a guest list of 26 cute and silly friends, I went the boxed route. No biggie! It made my life so much easier to do it this way. I purchased enough boxed yellow cake mixes, brownie mixes and sugar cookie mixes to make the yummy treats I needed for the party.

This cake is fairly simple to make. I baked a yellow cake mix in a regular round cake pan and a second yellow cake in a Pyrex glass bowl. Spray each with Pam Cooking Spray For Baking~it has flour mixed into the spray making it much easier to turn the cakes out of the pans. While the yellow cake "hamburger buns" are cooling, mix one brownie mix and pour into a round cake pan (either the same pan that has been completely washed, or another pan exactly the same size as the one previously used). Bake the brownie "hamburger patty" just until set. Remove from the oven, turn out of pan and let cool completely.

Now assemble the hamburger cake with lettuce, mustard and ketchup Frosting, here's how:

This is another of my favorite frosting recipes~

(You can use canned frosting too, nothing wrong with that. Whatever makes your day easier! I just enjoy the flavor of homemade frosting best.)

Perfect Buttercream Frosting

5 T butter 2 1/3 c powdered sugar

dash of salt 1/2 t vanilla extract

3 T milk red, green, yellow and blue food coloring

Soften butter, add salt and powdered sugar. Beat until smooth and fluffy. Add vanilla extract. Separate frosting into 4 different medium sized bowls. Keep one bowl of frosting white (mayonnaise), add red food color (a lot!) into another bowl with 1 very tiny drop of blue (this will make the ketchup a little bit deeper in color), add yellow (again, a lot!) into another bowl (mustard), and in the last bowl add a few drops of green (lettuce).

Fill 1freezer Ziploc baggy (thicker than the regular baggies) with red, another with yellow and last with green. Cut a small tip off of the corner of each baggie, set aside.

First place bottom hamburger bun on a cake stand or plate, using the white frosting frost a medium size inner circle on top of the bottom bun. Place round brownie center on top. Frost a smaller inner circle on top of the brownie layer, also pipe each condiment frosting as desired for the lettuce, mustard and ketchup. Place top cake bun on top of the brownie layer. Place in refrigerator until ready to display and serve. That's it, you're done!

Mini Hamburgers and Sugar Cookie Fries

Next I found this great tutorial for Mini Hamburgers and Sugar Cookie Fries here:

http://www.bakerella.com/fast-food-fun/ I think the buns came out much more realistic and cute when I left them in the oven until they were a medium golden brown.

I made these as part of the party favors. I made a small "Cooking Mama" card to add to the theme and slipped them into each of the vellum fry holder's I made. I also made the paper food trays which I downloaded from here: http://zakkalife.blogspot.com/2010/03/how-to-make-paper-food-baskets.html. I googled "red gingham images" and found a cute pattern I liked. I then resized it and printed the pattern onto cardstock, reran it through the printer with the paper food tray download and made enough for each guest at the party. I then lined each paper food tray with tracing paper and added the hamburger cupcake and sugar cookie fries.

Sugar Cookie Fries with Mustard and Ketchup Frosting

I used the extra Sugar Cookie Fries and condiment frostings as part of the treats at the party. I also made Peanut Butter and Jelly Sushi Rolls and Honey Caramel Popcorn.

Games!
As each guest arrived they chose a handkerchief to wear on their heads like Cooking Mama. The boys can wear the handkerchiefs around their necks like a chef. They chose from Red, Pink, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue and Purple.

Marshmallow Skewers

The kids had 15 seconds on a timer to put 5 large marshmallows on their sticks. This one was a lot of fun!

Hot Dog! (Hot Potato)

My husband found the cutest plush hamburger and hot dog at the dollar store. We played Cooking Mama music from Youtube as they passed the Hot Dog around as quickly as they could!

Egg Relay Race

I hard boiled 3 eggs and split everyone into teams of two. One person had to walk across the room balancing an egg on a plastic fork in their mouth, while the other tried to catch the egg being dropped into a cupcake cup at the end. Lot's of fun and giggles!

Cook The Fish In The Pot Toss