For the sports fanatic or baseball lover in your life, a baseball-themed cake is a must for any party or celebration. However, if you are like me and baking is far from your strong suit, learning how to make an innovative baseball cake can be challenging.
I never could find the right cake recipes to fit my needs. I always ended up with cakes that were too underbaked or overbaked and cakes that suffered from misshapen, uneven decoration. However, this is why I put this article together. Finding the right cake recipes is half the battle of creating a fantastic cake. With the proper method and instructions, creating a tasty and beautiful baseball cake is within reach.
Fortunately, I have found some great baseball cake ideas that are sure to help you create a stunning masterpiece without too much fuss or trouble. Let’s dive into these recipes and get inspired!
What Is A Baseball Cake?
A baseball cake is a simple but effective cake idea that can take many forms. From chocolate to red velvet cake, the flavor of your baseball themed cake is totally up to you. Moreover, there is no set way to create a baseball cake. The way it looks depends entirely on your creativity and skill level.
One of the most common and basic presentations of a baseball cake is a real baseball. Some people use two simple, round cake tins and buttercream to create a flattened version of a baseball. Other people get more innovative by using round baseball cake pans to build a round a baseball cake.
However, a baseball cake does not always take the form of a baseball. A baseball cake can also indicate a type of cake that embodies the spirit of baseball or some other aspect of baseball. For example, a baseball-themed cake can also be a cake made into the shape of a baseball jersey or a baseball diamond. Essentially, there is a world of possibilities to explore, some of which will be discussed in further detail later on.
The point is that you are not limited to just making a baseball-shaped cake. Depending on the person you are making the cake for, the design of the cake is sure to vary. As such, let’s take a more in-depth look at some of these recipes and baseball cakes designs.
How to Make a Baseball Cake?
Like I mentioned above, the most basic and fool-proof type of baseball-themed cake is a cake that takes the basic shape of a baseball. Here is a straightforward baseball birthday cake recipe that serves around ten people and only takes 25 minutes to prepare.
Ingredients:
- 3 cups of flour
- 4 sticks of softened, unsalted butter
- 7 egg whites
- 2 teaspoons of baking powder
- 2 cups of granulated sugar
- ½ teaspoon of salt
- 2 tablespoons of vanilla extract
- 1 cup and 2 tablespoons of milk
- 4 cups of confectioners’ sugar
- Red food coloring
Instructions:
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and prepare two 9-inch round cake pans with grease and flour. Add a layer of greased parchment paper to the pans.
- In a medium-sized bowl, combine the dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, and salt.
- In an electric hand mixer or standing mixer, blend 2 sticks of softened butter with the granulated sugar. Beat on medium speed until the mixture is light and fluffy. Add a tablespoon and a teaspoon of vanilla. And a pinch of salt into the mix, saving the rest for the frosting.
- While keeping your mixer on low speed, slowly add in the egg whites. Make sure you scrape down the sides of the bowl for an even and thorough mix. Then, bring the mixer speed up to high and beat until the mix is smooth.
Turn the speed to low and the flour mixture in thirds while alternating with the 1 cup of milk. Beat until smooth. Try to not mix it for longer than a minute.- Split the batter between the two cake pans and bake for 40 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean from the center of the case. Let the cakes cool in their pans for about 10 minutes before taking them out onto a rack to let them cool completely.
Decorating Instructions:
- While the cake is cooling down, take your electric mixer and beat the remaining 2 sticks of softened butter with the confectioner’s sugar. Make sure to mix at a low speed to avoid making a mess.
- Slowly mix in the remaining 2 teaspoons of vanilla and the 2 tablespoons of milk and mix until it is fluffy and smooth.
- Separate a ¼ cup of the buttercream into a small bowl and use some of the red food coloring to dye it to match the red stitching of a baseball.
- Now that the cakes are cool take the first cake layer onto a cake stand or platter. Take a dollop of the undyed frosting and spread a thin, even layer on top of the cake. Then, place the second layer on top to make a sandwich. Frost the top of the second layer and cover the sides with the remaining frosting.
- Using a plastic Ziplock bag with a corner cut off, pipe the red frosting onto the cake in the pattern of baseball stitching.
This particular recipe uses the batter to create a traditional sandwich cake to look like a flattened down version of a baseball. However, if you want a baseball-shaped cake with a more realistic, spherical shape, use a bowl or a spherical baking pan for baking your cake instead of a traditional round cake pan.
Baseball Cake Decorating
While half of the trouble is in the recipe, the other half is in the decorating. In theory, decorating seems simple. However, it can be a lot more challenging than you think, especially if you have little cake decorating skills. Here are a couple of baseball cake decorating tips and tricks to help make the whole process easier.
For Frosting or Icing Decoration:
- Use a straight or offset spatula to help smooth your frosting or icing. You can also use it to level off your batter.
- You can use a cake turntable for more convenient frosting. A turntable allows you to spin the cake to spread the icing instead of having to reach around the cake.
- If you can, invest in piping bags. A ziplock bag can work fine enough, but as cakes get more elaborate, a piping bag can allow you more creative freedom. It is because piping bags can also be fitted with a variety of tips to create fun textures on your cake.
- For clean edges, use strips of waxed paper. Tuck the pieces of waxed paper under the sides of your cake. It will prevent your board or cake stand from having a messy side.
- For the best frosting consistency, refrigerate before you frost. An excellent way to judge the consistency is that the frosting should be thick enough to cling to your spatula until you tap it on the side of a bowl.
- Ice your cake with a crumb coat and refrigerate to prevent your final layer of frosting from picking up any cake pieces.
- Practice before you pipe! Even if the piped decoration is simple, you want to ensure you have a steady hand and your design in mind. So, use a plate or another flat surface to practice your piping.
For Fondant Decoration:
- When using fondant, roll it out in a cold, dry room with powdered sugar to prevent sticking.
- Ensure your cake is completely cold before applying fondant. Otherwise, decorating will get messier than you might like.
- To make fondant decoration more interesting, play with color and texture. Fondant provides a blank canvas for whatever decoration you need. For example, for your baseball birthday cake, add the shape of a baseball for a more realistic touch.
- If you do plan on coloring your fondant, be aware of the fact that color does deepen in fondant over time. As such, be smart about how much dye you add ahead of time. You can always add more, but you cannot take away.
- Play around with the thickness of your fondant. A layer of fondant that is too thick can collapse because of all the extra weight. However, fondant that is too thin can easily tear.
- Make sure you store your leftover fondant in an airtight container. Fondant dries quickly and can crack if not stored properly.
These tips helped make cake decorating far less daunting for me. However, like all things, practice makes perfect. As such, do what you can to practice your baseball cake skills before you do the real job to ensure you get the best result.
Baseball Cap Cake
Now, as I mentioned earlier, a baseball-shaped cake is not the only type of baseball themed cake. There are many other types of fun baseball cakes designs out there that take the theme to a whole new level. The first type I want to share with you is the baseball cap cake. A baseball cap cake is a step up from a simple baseball-shaped cake, but it still makes use of the round cake pans.
Here Is How You Make the Baseball Cap Cake:
1. To Start, Make the Cake Mix of Your Choice:
You can use a pre-made, store-bought cake mix, or you can make one from scratch. Here is a great cake recipe you can use for chocolate cake and peanut butter frosting:
Chocolate Layer Cake
2 ½ cups of flour- 1 cup of unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1 ½ teaspoon of salt
- 2 tablespoons of espresso powder
- 1 teaspoon of baking soda
- 2 ½ cups of granulated sugar
- 3 sticks of softened unsalted butter
- 4 eggs
- 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
- 2 ¼ cup of milk
Peanut Butter Frosting
- ⅔ cup of smooth peanut butter
- 1 cup of unsalted, softened butter
- 3 cups of powdered sugar
- ½ teaspoon of salt
- ¼ to ½ a cup of heavy cream, depending on the consistency you want
2. Fill Your Round Cake Tin with The Batter and Bake:
After it is cooked and cooled, turn the cake out onto a cake board or a cake stand.
3. Crumb Coat the Cake with The Peanut Butter Frosting and Leave It in The Fridge to Cool
4. While the Crumb Coat Is Chilling in The Refrigerator, You Can Take Some Time to Create the Brim of The Hat
You can do this in several ways. The easiest way is to take some fondant and roughly trace out the shape of the rim or bill of the hat. Then, use a stitching tool or a toothpick to create the stitches on the hat. When you are satisfied with your design, use a piece of cardboard on the brim of the hat to support and set the fondant brim piece until it dries.
5. After the Crumb Coat Has Set, Take the Cake Out of The Fridge
Roll a layer of fondant out to a thin even layer and quickly cover the cake. Use your hands or a fondant smoothing tool to smooth out any bumps on the cake and make sure the fondant is even on the cake.
6. Use A Stitching Tool or A Toothpick to Create the Stitches on The Hat
Then, attach the brim with a bit of frosting laid down on the surface of the cake board.
7. Finish Off the Baseball Cap Cake By Adding Any Other Logos Or Designs You Want
The great thing about this hat cake is that it can be specialized in any way. You can easily dye the fondant a color to match a specific team. Just make sure you color the fondant ahead of time to let the color deepen.
Additionally, you can also use more fondant to create the logo of a specific team. An easy way to do this is to print out the logo or design on the internet. Now place it on top of a piece of fondant and use a toothpick to trace out the design. Finally, you can cut out the design using a small knife and attach it to the hat using frosting or a little bit of water.
Baseball Cupcakes
If making a big cake seems too daunting, try starting with something smaller like cupcakes. Cupcakes are a convenient option if you need something to feed a large group of people, such as a little league team. Here is how you create some cute baseball themed cupcakes.
- To make the cake batter, you can use any scratch recipe of choice. However, if you need to make several batches of cupcakes, it would be more convenient to use a pre-made, store-bought mix. I suggest using chocolate cake or a funfetti mix.
- Once you bake the cupcakes according to the instructions/recipe, you can move onto making the fondant decorations. To make the fondant decorations, take plain white fondant and roll it out to about a ½ inch thickness.
- Measure the size of the top of the cupcakes and cut out fondant circles to match.
- Finally, finish out the design by piping on the red baseball stitching. Let it dry.
It is an effortless design, but it takes a bit of repetition and elbow grease to get it done. Moreover, a cupcake, despite its size, still provides a lot of real estate to try out some designs. You could also make small baseball jerseys out of fondant and use them as toppers. Additionally, you can put a grass tip on a piping bag and ice the cupcake green before placing the fondant decoration for extra realism and dimension.
Baseball Diamond Cake
Our last recipe and baseball cakes design idea is a baseball diamond cake. This idea is a little bit more complicated and requires a bit of work, but the result is positively exciting and eye-catching.
Here Is How You Make A Baseball Diamond Cake:
- Like with the other cakes designs, the cake flavor is entirely up to you. However, since the design of the cake is pretty much set, you should try and get more creative with the inside of the cake. Perhaps, you should try a carrot cake or a marbled cake. An easy way to make a marble cake is to take a yellow and chocolate cake mix and blend them in a cake pan together. Then, take a skewer and lightly swirl through the mix to make the marbled effect. Whatever cake you choose, be sure to bake it in a rectangular or square pan.
- After you bake your desired cake, let it cool then turn it out onto a clean surface for carving and icing. If you baked the cake in a square tin, you should not have to do any carving. However, if you baked the cake in a rectangular tin, you may have to carve the cake to get it into the correct baseball diamond shape.
- Cover the cooled and shaped cake in a layer of green frosting. For a more natural grass texture, be sure to leave mounds and irregularities in the icing. If you want the look of Astroturf, try and get the frosting as smooth as possible.
- Place a 3-inch circle of brown icing as the home plate area. You can also use brown sugar or crumbled up cake for the same effect.
- Place 2-inch squares of brown icing at the other corners of the cake to create the other bases. You can then place white fondant as the bases or even use white icing to paint the bases as well.
- Finish off the baseball diamond by adding a pitcher’s mound to the middle of the cake. Then, using white frosting, draw the base paths between the bases.
It Is A Great Way to Bring Baseball to Life at Any Birthday Party or Event
Moreover, this baseball-themed cake design also has room for creativity. For example, you can create fondant figurines to populate the baseball mound. You can go over the top and build a whole stadium to surround the cake. You can also go extremely simple and pared down by merely writing out a team name in the center of the baseball diamond.
Conclusion
This article showed you just about everything you need to know about creating an exciting and unique baseball cake. Now, you are ready with a simple but sensational cake recipe that you can use in any cake design.
You even have great decorating tips that will come in handy as you start to challenge your cake making skills more and more. Moreover, you also have a guide to some baseball-themed cake designs, ranging from the simple and straightforward to the more elaborate and unique.
Now you know that you don’t have to stick to a boring baseball-shaped cake to celebrate your favorite team or favorite sportsman in your life. So, the next time it’s time to “batter up,” try one of the designs and recipes I shared above. Who knows? You might hit a grand slam with your excellent cake design!
