So, You’ve Been Asked to Bake for the School Bake Sale. Now What?

Bake sales are about appealing to the mini masses, so you want to choose a winning recipe from the start. It should be something simple enough to make without a fuss, familiar-looking (don’t forget that most of your customers are kids) and presented with a little flair. Here’s our best advice for a sold-out sale.

What you’ll need:

• Get a platter or nice basket to display your goods. Both are universally available at every dollar store in town, so buy it there. (That way, if it never makes its way back to you, there’s no harm done.)
• Small cellophane bags with twist ties are a great way to display anything from bar cookies to small treats that might come two or three to a serving.
• Make a sign. Using big, clear letters, write out the name of your dish and, if possible, the main ingredients.

Great recipes for bake sales:

Chocolate Chip Cookies: You can’t go wrong with cookies, ever. Here are four tasty twists on the most-popular cookie of all, chocolate chip.

• Chocolate Chip Cookies with Almond Meal (Instead of Flour)
• Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies (pictured above)
• No-Sugar Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Chocolate-Chocolate Chip Cookies

Bar Cookies: The easiest sweets are always bar-shaped. No rolling individual balls or cookie sheets needed — just bake in one big pan and cut. From healthy choices to downright decadence, here are our favorites.

• Homemade Strawberry Cereal Bars with Whole Oats (pictured above)
• Ina Garten’s Outrageous Brownies
• 7-Ingredient Mascarpone Chocolate Toffee Bars
• Ree Drummond’s 5-Star Marshmallow Crispy Treats

And if that’s not enough, click through Food Network Magazine’s collection of 50 Bar Cookie recipes here!

Muffins & Quick Breads: Not every kid has a sweet tooth, and some parents like buying for breakfast the next day, so I always bring a batch (or two) of low-sugar homemade muffins or bread like these.

• Better-for-You Chocolate Banana Muffins
• Maple Syrup-Sweetened Sweet Potato Whoopie Pies (pictured above)
• Zucchini Chocolate Chip Breakfast Cookies

Sweet Treats: Most of these do best packed in a cellophane bag, and again the choices range from pretty darn healthy to devilishly sweet.

• No-Bake Chocolate Fruit & Nut Balls
• Marshmallow Pops
• Chocolate-Covered Pretzels (Twists or Rods)
• Whole-Wheat Jam Tarts
• Adorable Apple-Shaped Cake Pops (Filled with Oreos) (pictured above)

 

Charity Curley Mathews is the founder of Foodlets.com, a site about raising kids who eat (and enjoy) all the foods. Follow her on Facebook and you’ll never miss a new recipe kids can’t resist.

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