The project that piqued our interest was baking desserts for a local Hospice Center. They accept homemade cookies, brownies/blondies, dessert bars, cake balls, mini muffins, sheet cakes, pound cakes, and dessert breads year round.
What does the Hospice Center use the desserts for?
They use them every weekday to host Tea Time for the patients, families, and visitors that are at the hospice home.
How many desserts do they use daily?
If they measure it in terms of cookies, they use approximately 8 dozen cookies every day - 8 dozen cookies a day equal 480 cookies a week! (And that's why they've reached out to students in Aidyn's service organization for help.)
So, we set a goal to make as many cakes for them as we could throughout the year.
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| Glazed Cherry Breakfast Cake |
Aidyn was in charge of picking the recipes, and this was a wonderful learning opportunity for him as well! (It's not often that a teenage boy gets THAT MUCH time in the kitchen baking with his Mama!)
When I bought the ingredients, I always bought two sets. We would get out two mixing bowls and set the recipe in between them. I would let Aidyn "do the driving" and tell me what ingredients to get out, what order to add them, how to mix things, etc.
We would donate the cake that Aidyn made, and we would keep the cake that I made. And Aidyn, of course, was learning how to follow a recipe and how to bake in the process!
Over the course of 2019, Aidyn was able to donate 7 cakes and he logged 21 volunteer hours for his service organization.
I've posted the recipes for all of these cakes on the blog (in case you're looking for some tasty cake recipes):
- Chocolate Fudge Cake with Fudge Frosting
- Yellow Cake with Nutella Frosting
- Toasted Coconut Sour Cream Cake
- Banana Pudding Poke Cake
- Glazed Cherry Breakfast Cake
- Earthquake Cake
- Mississippi Mud Cake
The first two cakes on this list are cakes that we have made before (in layer form), but the others on the list are sheet cake recipes that were new to us and we tried specifically for this project. (And, boy, were they winners!) For the two layer cake recipes, we followed a few steps for how to convert a layer cake to a sheet cake and they turned out perfect.
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| Mississippi Mud Cake |
Baking for Local Charities
This is the perfect time of year to decide to get involved and bake for a charity that is local to you! You can talk to people at
- nursing homes
- children's homes
- women's shelters
- homeless shelters
- churches
- soup kitchens
- food pantries
to see if they might be interested in baked good donations and what types of homemade food items they might accept.
Before you get started, make sure to contact the organization and ask if they can accept a homemade food donation. If so, then ask if there are any requirements (like how to package or label the items, or if there are any ingredients that you should not include, such as nuts).
Other Local Charities to Try
Keep in mind, some charitable organizations might not be able to accept food items to consume, but they might host baking competitions and/or bake sales as a fundraiser for their organization. If you might be interested in putting your skills to use in that way, make sure to check with local charities that are near and dear to your heart, such as:
- hospitals
- cancer centers
- animal shelters or rescues
- police departments
- fire departments
- schools
Charities That Accept Baked Goods as Donations
If you don't have a local charity that accepts homemade baked good donations, look into baking goods for service members:- Angel Bakers Team The Angel Bakers Team is a team of highly dedicated Soldiers’ Angels volunteers who support our service members by sending a one-time care package, monthly, of homemade goodies for our deployed military heroes.
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| Toasted Coconut Sour Cream Cake |
Whether you're interested in learning some new recipes or expanding your baking skills, or just looking to make a difference by donating your time and your talents, I hope this has inspired you to put your talents to use!
Now you know some resources you might be able to donate some baked goods, so you're all set to bake some treats to donate this year!
Happy Baking!
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