To make a birthday cake and not cut it

I've seen parents do this with allsorts of cakes, big, small, fancy, not fancy. Then not give the kids any cake. It's so odd! U can get a big great cake from tesco for @£15, tart it up ans it looks fabulous, I've had random ppl not in our party compliment it. I always give out cake at the party and offer any to take home. Got a fancy expensive cake last year, looked amazing bt didn't taste all that.

Yeah I don't get it

If it had tiers, you could take the decorative top tier home and serve / give in the party bags the plain bottom tier? That might work as a compromise?

There's a difference between not handing it out to be eaten as part of the party and not choosing to have a squashed mess in a party bag.

If it's something like a soft play party I've never been offered cake there as the expectation is only to feed the kids.

By the time the cake is brought out the kids are high on ice cream and slushies and are more interested in bouncing off the walls.

The variation in answers probably reflect what people have in mind when you say party.

Only on Mumsnet, birthday cake is for show and not for actual guests to eat. And that's considered normal, while the rest of us here on Planet Earth are scratching our heads!

It's a cake! It's made to be cut, sliced, eaten and devoured!

Make two cakes if it's that precious.

Probably not in most cases 😂.

My DC likes to cut their own cake with a huge amount of flourish and ceremony and a massive knife. Their closest friends (or at least the friends of the moment) crowd round and DC1 bountifully promises them the various bits of the cake which take their fancy. I console those who end up on the edge of the crowd and promise that I'll protect their interests when slicing the rest of the cake and apportioning refined sugar. It could be quite dangerous but DH and I hover with a hand on DC's arm to make sure the knife stays on target. After cutting a couple of rows, DC gets bored and wants their own piece of cake, but I insist that as host DC stays and hand out cake to all attendees before they can have their own. We take requests seriously and a sort of horse-trading goes on to make sure everyone is happy - "You can't have that star because Freddie is having it but would you boys like to share the big flag instead?"

We cut and serve the cake at the party and it is A BIG DEAL.

We all have our moments 😂.

I'm not sure anyone is meant to be eating huge chunks of fondant but the "punishment" for parents who were not watching their children closely at my DC's last party was that those kids ended up chowing down on the fairly chunky 3D car-shaped fondant blocks with which I had lovingly adorned the cake, when I lost the battle to stop them being snatched. I would not have liked to be around for the resultant sugar rush/sore tummies 😅.

Cut and serve at the party.
A friend does this and it’s bloody weird. She makes an amazing cake and no one had ever tasted it!

Why?

What a waste of the ingredients if no one is going to eat it.

Do you just throw it away?

I have experienced this too. I have also had dc question why they got a cupcake and not birthday cake. Children do notice and it is disappointing if they were looking forward to it.

It’s weird, also a bit mean spirited. People do notice. Give them the cake.

Cakes for ahow are one of my pet peeves. Nobody cares about how beautiful it is really, they just want to eat it.

I'm not sure if celebration cakes are actually for eating.

This is something I think about quite a bit.

I do think there are edible celebrations that you're not meant to eat.

You just could.

There's obviously an emotional lode on birthday cakes, that actually mean a lot more than the sponge.

It's an interesting one.

It's making me a bit teary.

My aunt used to make the birthday cakes for my children and she'd make two. One had the candles on and we'd sing happy birthday. That one went home with us for the family celebration. The second cake I cut at home before we went and wrapped it so it was all ready to go home with the children

But neither cake at around for long because cake is for eating

Oh, this has broken my heart a bit.

Sorry to sound snarky, but I suspect what the OP means is "The place where I'd cut it isn't gorgeous enough to create photos worthy of my social media."

Cakes can be cut anywhere. I usually have birthday parties on a rug in the park!

I know!

This was 15 years ago, so pre-Insta.

I have no idea what was going on in my brain.

I've done both cake in party bags and cupcakes in party bags.

If the party is in a venue where I have help from the staff to host it/they do the hosting, then I bake a cake big enough for all guests, it gets cut up and put in the party bags.

If I'm hosting the party at home, I bake a cake big enough for the three of us to have a slice, and place it on a tiered cake stand with matching cupcakes below (that are usually fancier than the actual cake). I have enough to be doing without madly trying to cut up a cake, wrap it and get it into party bags. I find it much easier to have the cupcakes ready to go in little individual boxes/pods so everyone just picks up a party bag and a cupcake on their way out.

I've been criticised for it on here before, but I'm not going to lose any sleep over that. I appreciate that everyone does things differently, and people might think it odd, but at the end of the day, when I'm hosting what is sometimes upwards of 30 children single handed, I am doing what makes it manageable for me.

But, what is the cake for?

If it's to be eaten at a later date, well.... it will get cut at that point anyway. And I agree with others, it looks quite rude to bring a cake to a party and then refuse to serve it.

If it's never going to be eaten.... surely throwing it in the bin would be more of a shame?

Sorry, but I too would be thinking "Oh God, an Instagram type," especially if you were going all-out photographing the cake without cutting it.

I've not RTFT but I DId This.

I spent hours lovingly making a tractor cake for DS's 3rd birthday.

I couldn't cut it. Couldn't do it.

I sent everyone away with buns.

And then threw the mouldy cake in the bin a few weeks later.

Retrospectively, I think I went a bit mental.

For his fourth birthday I spent even longer making a pirate cake and party and just went with it. It was fine.

That tractor cake? No.

It's your DD's birthday. It's your DD's birthday cake

Would she like it cut at the party? ............... (that's the whole tradition of a cake at a birthday party??)

Or is it all about you and how much work you've put in and what you want so the whole effect isn't 'ruined' and people can admire the effort you've put in??

Because there's a world of difference

I’ve heard it all now. Unbelievable. Even Marie Antoinette let them eat cake!!