Hey everyone,
I'm new to cakecentral (and decorating), but I'm totally addicted!
I'm making a cake for my niece's 4th birthday party at the end of the month, but my brother (her dad) is diabetic. Does anyone have any good ideas for cake or frosting that everyone could enjoy?
Thanks!

Hi - welcome to CC!!

Under the "recipes" section on this site, there are several daibetic recipes.

good luck!

I decorated a couple of cakes for a woman who's daughter is diabetic. I ordered Sweet n' Low cakes online (one box only makes 1 layer). They turned out great. I had tried splenda recipes and they did not turn out AT ALL. The Sweet n' Low cakes are great. Then for icing I made Italian meringue buttercream. For the sugar syrup I used the 1 cup of sugar, but used 1/2 cup of splenda for the egg white mixture. I told my friend that there was 1 cup of sugar in the entire recipe so they could calculate how much extra insulin to give her daughter. They were quite happy with the result and the daughter loved the cake.

Audraj, here are the ingredients for the sweet n' low cakes:

ENRICHED BLEACHED FLOUR (FLOUR, NIACIN, IRON, THIAMINE MONONITRATE, RIBOFLAVIN, FOLIC ACID), SORBITOL*, CORN STARCH, PROPYLENE GLYCOL MONO AND DI ESTERS OF FAT AND FATTY ACIDS, MALTODEXTRIN, DRIED EGG ALBUMEN, CELLULOSE FIBER, NONFAT DRY MILK, MONO AND DIGLYCERIDES, POTASSIUM BICARBONATE, SODIUM ALUMINUM PHOSPHATE, MODIFIED CORN STARCH, SOY LECITHIN, CALCIUM PHOSPHATE, GUAR GUM, ARTIFICIAL FLAVOR, XANTHAN GUM, ACESULFAME POTASSIUM.

Sweet n' low is traditionally associated with saccharin, but fortunately saccharin is not a component of this mix (saccharin tastes really bad).

There's two reasons why this makes such a good cake. First, it relies on the sugary texture of sorbitol, a sugar alcohol, to provide moistness/cohesiveness in the cake. Second, it combines two sweeteners, sorbitol and acesulfame potassium. When you get into multiple sweeteners, the quality of taste improves dramatically.

Btw, if you like the sweet n' low mix, I would definitely recommend trying this recipe from the recipe section, as it too is sorbitol based.

http://www.cakecentral.com/cake_recipe-2010-7-Diabetic-White-Cake.html

If you make it yourself, you'll probably save a ton of money. Sorbitol is available at most health food stores. Acesulfame Potassium (ace k for short) is also available in some supermarkets under the brand name Sweet One. You might want to play around with adding a little Sweet One to the sorbitol recipe- you don't need much, not more than a packet.

Splenda doesn't work because it provides little to no sugary texture. With it you get dry, poorly textured cakes. The splenda baking blend works okay, but, being 50% sugar, isn't suitable for clients requesting 'sugar free' baked goods. The other shortcoming of splenda is that if you're working with a bitter ingredient that requires extra sweetening, such as chocolate or coffee, the additional splenda required results in a very noticeable metallic aftertaste. All in all, splenda, on it's own, doesn't work for baking. If you see splenda as the sole sweetener in a recipe... track down a different recipe.

Lastly, sorbitol, like all sugar alcohols, can be laxating. A lot of people tolerate it fine, but some people are more sensitive to it than others. For most people, it's dose dependent- i.e. as long they don't eat a ton of it, they're fine. I'm not sure if the woman you baked the cake for is a client or a friend, but when baking sorbitol based baked goods for others, it's a good idea to warn them of the potential laxation involved. The last thing you want to happen is for a guest to overdo it and end up in the bathroom all night.

Jillchap, with recent discoveries in nutrition the last few years, the term 'diabetic' has evolved away from being synonomous with 'sugar free.' Quite a few diabetics these days monitor all their carbs, not just sugar carbs, so it's not as simple as removing the sugar from a recipe. With these individuals, you need to reduce the white flour as well.

There's also a surprisingly large number of diabetics that eat sugar/white flour based desserts, in moderation, and medicate accordingly. If you bake these people a sugar free cake only to find out that they can't eat sugar, you've wasting a lot of time.

There really is no one single diabetic way of eating. If you've got a diabetic client, it's best to discuss what they can and cannot eat and not just assume that they're looking for a sugar free product.

thanks for the head's up scott... you're a smartie! I had been looking up info on the diabetes.org website and came across a lot of useful stuff there.

I guess the bottom line is being able to tell my brother the nutritional breakdown for the cake so that if he wants to eat it he can adjust his meds accordingly.

Thanks again!