First Birthdays · Cake Trends · Strong Feelings
Cake Smashing: Cute Milestone Or Cake Crime?
In today’s edition of “Things That Make No Sense”, people are buying cakes specifically to obliterate them for the gram. Because nothing says “happy first birthday” quite like wasting a perfectly good cake while a baby looks mildly confused under a cloud of buttercream.
For real, it is a thing. It is called a cake smash. And if you are anything like me, the thought of a celebration cake being smashed, smooshed, squished and generally sacrificed for content is pretty horrifying.
Nobody wants to own up to inventing this mess, probably because they know deep down it is ridiculous. But somehow, over the last decade, cake smashing for baby birthdays has become a first birthday photoshoot trend in the US, and it is gaining ground here in the UK too.
A smash cake is a small cake made for a baby, usually on their first birthday, to prod, grab, smear and destroy during a photoshoot. It can make cute pictures, yes. It can also be wasteful, sticky, stressful and a tiny bit absurd.
What Is A Smash Cake?
A smash cake is a cake made and bought specifically so a one-year-old can wreak havoc on it. The idea is simple: put the cake in front of the baby, wait for them to plunge their tiny hands into the frosting, then photograph the glorious chaos.
The result is meant to be delightfully cute: baby with frosting on cheeks, sponge in fists, parents squealing nearby, everyone pretending this is completely normal human behaviour.
And look, I do understand the logic. Babies are adorable. Cake is adorable. Messy babies with cake are, allegedly, Instagram gold. But there is something deeply unhinged about baking a cake with the sole intention of destroying it.
Professional photographers now offer cake smash packages to capture a baby’s first big encounter with refined sugar. Forget first steps. Forget first words. Apparently, the real milestone is watching your child go feral on a sponge.
Cake Is For Eating, Not Pulverising
Cake is for eating. Not for pulverising. Not for content. Not for creating a buttercream crime scene that needs its own clean-up package.
Baby not into cake? Just bring cake to baby. Pic via themommyproject.com
There is no denying that cute babies and cute cakes can make a very sweet photo. I am not immune. I have eyes. I have a heart. I also have a fairly intense emotional attachment to cake being eaten rather than obliterated.
The oddest part is that lots of babies are not even that into it. Some stare suspiciously. Some cry. Some pat the frosting once and immediately regret every life choice that led them there. And then the adults start encouraging the smash because the photo needs to happen.
I am not entirely sure when engineering Pinterest-worthy scenes of a child destroying dessert became a normal part of turning one, but here we are.
Maybe, just maybe, a cupcake could do the job. Mash one cupcake. Take the picture. Keep the other eleven intact for actual humans to eat. Radical, I know.
The Better First Birthday Cake Idea
Instead of buying a cake purely for destruction, choose a cake that both baby and guests can enjoy. You can still give your little one a slice, let them get messy, take the adorable photos and then, crucially, serve the rest of the cake to people who want to eat it.
Number birthday cake by Anges de Sucre
For a first birthday, our number one birthday cake makes much more sense. It still feels playful, colourful and properly celebratory, but it is not designed to be a disposable prop.
Our vanilla sponge is sandwiched and frosted with smooth, silky vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream, glazed with Belgian chocolate drip and decorated with a pastel buttercream piped mosaic. Swirly, whirly, florally and far too nice to be launched into the carpet.
Put a slice of this in front of your baby and I am fairly confident you will get the same cute messy cake pictures, without sacrificing an entire cake to the social media gods.
Give the baby a slice, not the whole cake. You still get the frosting face, the sticky fingers and the adorable photos, while everyone else gets to enjoy the birthday cake like civilisation intended.
So, Is Cake Smashing The Dumbest Cake Trend Ever?
I will be generous and say this: the pictures can be cute. First birthdays are emotional. Parents want a memory. Babies covered in icing are objectively funny.
But as a cake person, I cannot fully get behind a trend built around destroying something beautifully baked and frosted. Ingredients, time, skill and deliciousness all went into that cake. Watching it get flattened for content feels, frankly, like a tiny tragedy in buttercream form.
So yes, I understand the cake smash. I simply do not support full cake annihilation when a slice would do the job perfectly well.
If your little one’s first birthday must involve cake, as it should, choose something worth eating. Smashing is for piñatas, not dessert.
Browse our number cakes and birthday cakes for first birthday celebrations that still give you the gorgeous photos, without wasting the cake.
Love,
Reshmi xoxo
Am I the only person who finds photos of babies covered in cake pretty revolting? I’ve seen the photo shoots, dress a baby up then cover it in cake, then bath it .. all for the camera? My children had a birthday cake shared with the family and they had a slice of it. Yes they made a mess, no I didn’t feel any urge to take photos of them daubed in food.
😂😂
I did a cake smash and I love the photos! It was totally worth doing as a milestone (also got a free photographer and personalised cake and signage, would have not paid for it otherwise).
If one day of my baby eating a few mouthful of cake and guest eating the leftovers is a crime, then I am guilty (and a chav supposedly)! 😉
I totally agree, when I turned one i got a biscuit with some fruit on it. I was happy with it. And by the way I never missed pictures of me smashing a cake
I’m not going to hate on your post. I too think a beautiful cake shouldn’t be destroyed like that. But, this phenomena goes further back then ten years in the US.
I was born in 1963, I have the photos from my first birthday in 1964, where I destroyed a large two-layer birthday cake. Everyone I knew growing up did this, and my Facebook feed is still filled with family and friends doing the same.
I think the only difference, is that the smash cake is more elaborate then in days past.
Completely agree why if ya really wanna see ya baby smash a cake up give them a simple cupcake you could make yaself why waste someone’s hard work and their hard earned money?
I assume you’re mortified by newlyweds smashing cake in each other’s faces? Is it a waste of valuable cake or toxic rubbish, I lost track. One day of a few bites of cake teaches NOTHING people. Plus, last time I checked this is exactly how one year olds eat literally everything. If you birth another human and keep them alive for a year, then want a pic of them smearing cake everywhere then you get that. No big deal. But no worries, I guarantee parents don’t care what you think and judging parents is pretty unoriginal content.
I’m kind of in agreement, it teaches kids to mess around with their food and a waste of money. Though for our daughters birthday I’m making a tiny healthy cake for her to try on the day and having an adult proper cake for her birthday… which will be smashed down with a glass of fizz!
Get a grip. I highly doubt that people are spending hundreds of pounds on a cake for a baby to smash it. Its personal choice and something fun to look back on, I dont see the problem. And I dont know why people concern themselves with what other do!
Completely agree. I hate the fact that this is gaining in popularity in the Uk. My children didn’t taste refined sugar until age 3, and they were hardly missing out. I would never have let them stuff themselves with unnecessary toxic rubbish just to provide a ludicrously staged photo “opportunity”! Ugh. Lets be honest, before age 3 or 4, birthday celebrations are purely for the adults and their friends.