Apple's 1st Birthday Cake!

Today is Apple's "presumed" first birthday, chosen because he was estimated to have been born at the end of January, and we found him on May 29. In honor of the day that he came into our lives, we chose his birthday to be today, January 29!

Because I am a very committed Dog Mom, I wanted to do something special for his birthday. A few months ago, I attended Austin's Dogtoberfest with my husband and Apple, and I learned about many Austin dog bakeries that offer birthday cakes for dogs.

I instantly thought that having a birthday cake sounded like a great idea! So, when I got home, I Googled "dog cake recipes" and found many different versions. I wanted the cake to be for all of us to share, so I didn't want anything that sounded too disgusting or was made with meat (I'm a vegetarian!)

I eventually settled on this applesauce cake recipe, because of Apple's name, and the fact that it seemed to be the most healthy recipe I could find. Dog cakes are low in baking soda because it is bad for dogs, but this one didn't have any, so I figured it was a good bet. It also came with a very easy recipe for cream cheese icing.

Here is the recipe:
3/4 cup unsweetened applesauce 
 2/3 cup hot water
1 cup whole rolled oats
3 eggs (I only used two and it worked.  Lower in cholesterol!)
1/2 cup vegetable shortening
1-1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
2 cups unbleached flour
1/2 cup granola 

The un-baked cake posing with its ingredients

 I also added a bit of sugar because upon tasting it I realized it was not sweet at all! Sugar isn't great for dogs, but it won't hurt them like chocolate, and I added a very small amount, just to make it taste a little better for the humans!

The icing was literally just 2 packages of cream cheese and 1/2 cup of shortening. I decided to add food coloring (I checked to make sure it was safe) to make the cake decorating festive and to save money (the original recipe called for carob to make decorative icing). I also added a little sugar and a bit of applesauce to the icing because it was just plain cream cheese and it needed to be a little sweeter!

The cake is baked and is surrounded by 3 colors of cream cheese icing

Apple LOVED his cake, and my husband and I both ate it and it wasn't bad. It tasted VERY healthy and would make a great breakfast. Apple ate 4 pieces, but he would have eaten the whole cake if we would have let him. We ate half of it between the three of us, and I saved the leftovers for tomorrow!

Ta-Da!

He likes it!

It was fun to bake a cake from scratch and decorate it for my dog! I think he had a great birthday. I know it was great for me!