OT: Any graduation cake ideas?

[TupperMom7]

My son will be graduating from high school at the end of the month. Much to my dismay, he wants a party - so that is what we are doing. Now I have to plan a menu, cook, etc. because we cannot afford to have it catered. And I need to make a cake. For my daughter, it was easy - lots of flowers, etc., but being he's a boy I wanted some other decorating ideas. Anyone have pictures to share or ideas for boys cakes? Or any websites you can recommend for cake decorating?

Thanks.

 

[addicted2dizney]

Hi,

My idea is simple... DD (14) graduating 8th grade...
I'm ordering a cake from Costco.... $14.99 for a half sheet cake.. no matter what I think of or do, I can't beat the price and it's delicious too...

Do you have Costco, Sams' Club or Bj's near you? They have so many wonderful party items and it looks like you catered without all the expense and time. My friend always does high end catered parties and last weekend she had her son's High School Graduation and bought it all through Costco...

Shrimp cocktail... veggie crudite, humus and pita chips... some hot hor's dorves,
Grilled Vegetables, potato salad from Costco.. ( I could not believe it was not homemade, she showed me the container!) Hamburgers, hot dogs, grilled chicken breasts, a mixed greens salad, and dessert, The sheet cake, some cookies and a fresh fruit. It was all in the presentation!

I swear I thought it was her usual expensive caterer. She was lucky enough to be able to afford two servers too but that is optional... Good Luck with your planning! I'm having 35 kids over Friday for DD's grad pool party and we are doing sub sandwiches, chips, fruit and cake. Thank God kids are easy!

 

[JaxJags08]

Will he be going to college? If so, maybe a cake shaped like the mascot of the college he will be going to.

 

[ah1126]

I'm a girl.... but for my cake it just had a graduation cap on it with Congradulations! then did streamers on the top in the school colors.

 

[Shelly F - Ohio]

A lot of the bakeries around here do photo cakes. You take them a photo and they enlarge the photo to the size of the cake. You get the photo back unharmed!
I did this for my sister 50th birthday and used a baby photo.

 

[dougsmom98]

Stars in the school colors would be easy and then just write Congratulations! You can also probably find some sort of decoration at the dollar store.

 

[dis-happy]

Costco cakes....all the way!!! Delicious and inexpensive...probably less than you can make it for, especially since they have the mousse filling in there too.

 

[Promomx2]

If you do a photo cake you could do what I did for my dd. Had her kindergarten pix on one side and then her senior portratit on the other. it turned out great.

 

[bdcp]

Costco does graduation cakes also. When my DS graduated college, I had one done in his school colors. Since it was a state school, Costco had it on their list already. Costco cakes are wonderful. We had a chocoloate cake with chocolate mousse. Yum. You can't beat the price or the taste.

 

[mskayjay]

For both kids we did the photo cake but the hit was that I also ordered trays of cookies from this wonderful Italian baking couple. Lots of leftover cake. Cookies? All gone! lol I would get a small cake and do the cookies in a larger order if I was doing this again. Everyone loved the idea that it wasn't "yet another graduation cake". lol

 

[lovetheprincesses]

Hi, for my DD's K grad, I did little grad cap candies.....a reese's with a dot of icing "glue" stuck to a chocolate covered graham cracker, then take yellow writing icing, and make a tassel. Make sense?

 

[luvtogo12]

Another vote for Costco! That is where I will be getting my cake. Can't beat the price and it is really good.

 

[erbie]

I saw this in one of those womens' magazines many years ago and have made it several times, all with great success. You can make a cake in the shape of a graduation cap pretty easily. You get a tube of that Pillsbury sugar cookie dough and roll, shape and cut it into a flat square and then bake it. When it's completely cooled, you frost it in the school color. Be sure to save a bit of it out for the button on the top. Get string licorice and shape into a tassel and the lay it across the top of the frosted cookie board and put the button in the center with the tassel loop around it. Write whatever message you like on the top of the board.

For the cake part, you use a baking bowl, like a Pampered Chef round mixing bowl/baking dish. Once it's done, turn it out of the bowl and have the round part up. Slice a little off the top so you have a flat surface and the board will sit nicely. Frost the cake in the same frosting as the board and then set the board on top.

This makes a great looking cake and it always gets lots of oohs and ahhs.

 

[j-kids]

What I have done for my son's cake is... Went to walmart and for 5 dollars got one of their graduation caps from the bakery. Then used my large wilton sheet pan and one of the wilton small round pans (about the size of the top layer of a wedding cake.) put the small one in the top left corner and put the graduation caps on it. then on the sheet cake use the school colors to write on it. Everyone thought I had gotten it from a bakery. Hope this helps. Becca

 

[Michelle67]

Yet another vote for Costco. You really can't beat the price and they are so delicious. With all the other preparations for a party, why bake and decorate a cake when you can get a HUGE and yummy one that cheap (although erbie's idea sure sounds cute)? My daughter graduated today, and that's where I got hers. They do grad cakes special order (cap and tassle in the school colors, with Congratulations Graduate, or you can have them put your son's name instead of "graduate"), or you can pick any cake out of the regular cooler and they will write on it for you. I lost my marbles this past week and forgot to order, so I went in this morning, picked a cake from the cooler, and they wrote "Congratulations Megan" on it for me. Five minutes and I was out of there. Gotta love Costco. I do recommend ordering, though. I lucked out finding a cake I liked at the last minute like that.

 

[pamjb]

I am having a graduation party for my son this weekend. All of the parties that we have gone to in the past have had a TON of cake leftover. A few weeks ago, we celebrated my younger son's birthday. He wanted big chocolate chip cookies. I used my regular choc chip cookie recipe and put the dough in pizza pans. Took a tube of icing and wrote Happy Birthday Nick on it. They were both gone in about 5 minutes. Perfect!

 

[Green Tea]

Costco! You will spend more buying supplies and it won't taste as good either. Those cakes are GREAT! They have a form to fill out. You write the colors of the school on the form. Ours was perfect!

 

[TupperMom7]

Thanks for the ideas so far. I really, really wish we had a Costco by us, but there isn't one. Has anyone ever bought a cake from BJ's Wholesale Club? There is one of those near us and I would like very much not to have to make the cake.

 

[dis-happy]

Thanks for the ideas so far. I really, really wish we had a Costco by us, but there isn't one. Has anyone ever bought a cake from BJ's Wholesale Club? There is one of those near us and I would like very much not to have to make the cake.

BJ's has very good cakes too. I used to always go there for large cakes until my Costco opened. You can also order the photo picture on the cake if you want.

 

[addicted2dizney]

Yes, they are good too, I don't know if they are the multi layer cakes like the Costco ones but they will be a great alternative. I'm going to order my cake for Friday tomorrow morning now that I know the weather will hold out for DD's pool party!