The best Mother’s Day present is cake

This may surprise you but moms are not the same. Some want crumbs, eggs, coffee, and jelly in their beds. I don't. That idea stresses me out. While I love eating and coffee and my bed and my daughter, I would like to keep these things far apart from each other. For Mother's Day, I love something homemade that I wouldn't make for myself.

If you want to know the perfect Mother's Day gift, ask your mom. And then listen! Some want to go running for hours or would appreciate a box of uni, oysters, and a steak. Some would like a frosty pink beverage and others don't even believe in frosé. Others who only act like your mom would appreciate an actual telephone call. Many who are not here anymore live in our cells and in what we learned from them. You can't know what your mom wants until you ask. But if you ask me, "what's the best Mother's Day gift?" I'd say it's cake.

My own mom taught me that it's possible to make a "very moist" chocolate layer cake with incredibly rich fudgy frosting, like this one, but with more brown sugar and oil. What I learned from her was not about technique. It was not even about baking or frosting, but that cake is a very nice thing to make for someone. The secret ingredient was nonchalance. She did not need it to be perfect, or to whip out a piping bag and a stand mixer or critique the texture of the crumb or expect it to be anything other than itself. She could do it on a Thursday, after work, and it would slowly disappear in smaller and smaller slices by Saturday morning.

The best thing about cake is that there are one zillion kinds—a favorite for every single mom. Including vegan and keto cakes, and ice-box cakes, and tiny molten cakes. Extravagantly tall and fluffy or short and deliciously dense cakes. Maybe she'd prefer a strawberry shortcake (you can easily cut the strawberries with this hack). Or you could try a tres leches, a rainbow, or the simplest, most incredibly creamy cheesecake with a single fork.

Once you ask your mom what she wants, try to give her that. Then, make her a cake to go along with it.

- Heather Ramsdell
Editorial Director, The Spruce Eats