The EPG Connection

Campfire Cake
Warm up your backyard summer birthday party with a fire kids can actually eat. Built with frosted pound cake logs, doughnut hole embers, and fruit leather flames, it’s sure to be the tastiest — and easiest — campfire you’ll ever make.

RECIPE INGREDIENTS:

1. With a knife, shave the square edges off the cakes to give them a log shape. Next, mix 1/4 cup of chocolate frosting into 1 cup of white to make a light tan. Place one log on a platter (a dab of frosting on the bottom will help hold it in place). Frost it with the chocolate and tan frostings as shown. To create bark and tree rings, scrape the tines of a fork across the chocolate frosting, then scratch a spiral into each tan end.

2. Pour the doughnut holes into a bowl and sprinkle them with confectioners’ sugar. Arrange 10 doughnut-hole embers in a single layer next to the frosted log, sticking them in place with frosting.

3. For the branch stub, cut a 1-inch slice from one end of the second log and trim it into a 2-inch circle; set the piece aside. Frost the bottom of the log and set it in place as shown. Use frosting to stick the stub to the second log. Create bark and rings again.

4. For flames, take a piece of fruit leather and, with the backing still in place, lightly wet half (lengthwise) of the fruit side with water. Fold it in half lengthwise and press to seal. Cut out flame shapes with scissors as shown, and then remove the backing.

5. Slice 2 doughnut holes in half. Put a dollop of the remaining white frosting onto the cut surface, and then set a flame on top. Squeeze decorators’ gel over the decorated doughnut holes, and then set them on the platter. Use any remaining doughnut holes to fill in the gaps between the logs. Decorate them with more flames and gel, if desired.

A Campfire You Can Eat
Not only is this snack fun to build and delicious to munch, but the process of preparing it also teaches campers the how-tos of safe campfire building

RECIPE INGREDIENTS:

1. To make an edible campfire, first clear a space on the table to build a safe fire. Lay down a tortilla fire base and wrap a licorice rope safety circle around the tortilla about an inch in from the edge. Build a peanut rock ring halfway between the safety circle and the center of the fire base. Spread a circle of peanut butter in the center of the fire base, and then lay a small handful of fried Chinese noodles on top for kindling.

2. Lay Tootsie Roll logs around the peanut butter circle. Use mini pretzel sticks as fuel wood to build a tepee inside the ring of logs and over the kindling, sticking the pretzels into the peanut butter at a 45-degree angle.

3. Add another layer of logs, setting them across the corners of the first layer to form a box around the tepee. Lay a few more pieces of fuel wood across the logs.

4. Make sure buckets of water (glasses of grape juice) and dirt (hot cocoa powder) are nearby to put out the fire if necessary, and then light the fire by adding candy corn flames.

5. After the camp director approves the fire, throw dirt on the fire to put it out. Now, the moment the fire builders have been waiting for: Eat your fires!