One of my kids’ all-time favorite children’s books is a picture book called The Seven Silly Eaters
I checked it out from the library years ago, and in a completely out-of-character move on my part, ran to the book store to buy it for ourselves. We loved it THAT much.
Synopsis of The Seven Silly Eaters
In the Seven Silly Eaters, a very devoted mother, Mrs. Peters, has a baby (or two) every year until she has a house FULL of seven little ones. Each child has their one particular dish or drink that they prefer….and nothing else will do.
Mrs. Peter spends her days wearing herself out over homemade applesauce, warm milk, strained oatmeal, freshly squeezed pink lemonade, eggs specially prepared, and homemade bread. Like so many moms with picky eaters, she is worn out.
On the eve of Mrs. Peter’s birthday, her 7 children decide that they are going to make Mom all of the foods that they love…the foods that Mom usually spends all day making for them. As expected, though their intentions are good, the kids can’t quite make everything like Mom, so in frustration, they dump all of their favorite foods into a pot together and hide the mess in the oven.
When Mrs. Peters wakes up on her birthday, she finds a “pink and plump and perfect cake” waiting for her in the oven.
The Seven Silly Eaters has been on the frequent request list recently, and on Sunday the kids asked it we could try making Mrs. Peter’s birthday cake at home.
It didn’t take me long to find a recipe on the author’s website: MaryAnnHoberman.com
Luckily, we had all of the ingredients at home. The kids were thrilled to help mix and bake the cake….and it has been a very popular treat to eat, too!
Mrs. Peters’ Birthday Cake
½ pound (2 sticks) sweet butter, softened
1 ½ cup granulated sugar
3 eggs
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour, sifted
1 cup oatmeal, quick or regular
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup milk
1 tablespoon lemon juice
¾ cup unsweetened applesauce
4 drops red food coloring1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Grease 10-inch tube pan.
2. Warm milk to 70 degrees and add 1 tablespoon of the lemon juice. Let sit 10 minutes until milk has thickened.
3. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time, blending well.
4. Sift together flour, baking soda, and salt. Stir in oatmeal.
5. Blend applesauce with thickened milk and red food coloring.
6. Stir dry ingredients into egg mixture alternately with the milk/applesauce mixture, beginning and ending with dry ingredients.
7. Pour batter into prepared tube pan. Set on the middle rack of the oven and bake for 1 hour and 5 minutes, or until cake pulls away from sides of pan and a tester inserted in the center comes out clean.
8. Cool cake in the pan on a rack for 10 minutes. Remove cake from pan.
Makes 8 to 10 portions
Have you read The Seven Silly Eaters
Note: the links to the book are Amazon affiliate links.
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It is one of our all-time favorite picture books! Glad you found the recipe. We had so much fun making it!
Reading this in my daughters kindergarten class and SO wanted to make a pink and plum and perfect cake. I googled cake recipe with applesauce, oats, milk, and lemon and sure enough I found you. SO HAPPY!!! Thank you SO much the kids will love this. A family fave book for sure.
It’s just dry oatmeal, unprepared. :) have fun with this!
So glad I found this! My maiden name is Peters, and so I just have to make this for my Mom. We found the book about 3 years ago, and have loved it ever since! I just have one question about the oatmeal (sorry. Mommybrain!) Is it one cup of prepared oatmeal, like the kind I would serve my kid in the morning? Or is it a dry version, without preparing it? Thanks!
It really is so much fun! It makes the book really come alive for the kids. :)
Oh, you must read it! It has been a favorite for years. Seriously, when my kids were little I would check out dozens of library books a week and we checked this out so many times that I decided to finally buy it (and I almost never buy a children’s book new!).
I’ve never read this!!!! Adding it to our list right now!
thanks for linking up, Lolli!!
I am crazy in love with pairing food with books – it is a fun way to really bring them to LIFE! loved this post Lolli, thank you for linking to it, I missed it the first time around.
Love this! It was one of our favorite books and still makes us laugh. I’ll have to see if I can modify it to make ti gluten free.
My kids LOVED this book when they were little. We had to buy it, too!! The rhyme is super catchy and the story is SO endearing! Glad to see your post about it!
That sounds like such a fun book! We’ll have to track it down. Thanks for sharing!
Much healthier then most cakes and it looks Delicious.
We LOVE this book!
What a fun recommendations. Thanks for sharing!!
I am going to have to look at this book. It looks wonderful. We will for sure be trying the cake!!
Awesome cake! I must have this book on our family bookshelf soon. It would be perfect for my own seven silly eaters:)
Hugs and Mocha,
Stesha