Skillnaija All courses →

Bake it, cost it, quote it

The capstone project for Baking & Cake Decorating Business — a free Trades course. Pass it and you earn a certificate anyone can verify.

Start the course free Download the project workbook

The project unlocks once you complete the lessons. The workbook is free to download now so you can see exactly what is expected.

What you will submit

A single pasted text submission containing your costing sheet for the 8-inch cake, your two-tier quote with delivery, your WhatsApp order-form and quote messages, your deposit policy, your allergen and storage advice, your compliance plan and draft packaged label, and your reflection — plus links to your two photos (a Google Drive or Google Photos link, or an Instagram post URL).

What to do, step by step

  1. Set your kitchen up properly first — hair tied, clean apron, hands washed, surfaces wiped, eggs cracked into a separate bowl — then bake one 8-inch butter cake using the master recipe from lesson four, weighing every ingredient in grams. Write down your oven type (gas, electric, or pot-and-sand), the real temperature you baked at, the total bake time, and one hygiene habit you changed after lesson six. Write down every allergen your recipe actually contains — wheat, egg, milk and anything else you added — because you will need that list later. Cut the cake and photograph a slice so the crumb is clearly visible.
  2. Crumb coat and finish the cake in buttercream: smooth sides, a clean top, one colour and one simple piped border or texture. Photograph the finished cake in daylight against a plain wall — no filters.
  3. Build a full costing sheet for that exact cake using prices you collected yourself this week at your own market (name it — Mile 12, Bodija, Sabon Gari, Ogbete, wherever you shop). List every ingredient with quantity and naira cost, then packaging, then gas or fuel, then your labour hours multiplied by the hourly rate you have chosen, then your overhead-per-cake figure with the working shown, then your waste allowance and profit margin, then the final price.
  4. Using the same method, price a two-tier order (8-inch on 6-inch) for a naming ceremony ten days from today. State how many guests it serves, list the design and any add-ons as separate line items, and quote a separate delivery fee for a named area you would actually drive to.
  5. Write out the exact WhatsApp messages you would send that customer: your ten order-form questions, your written quote with the price and its validity period, your deposit and cancellation policy in plain, polite language, your written allergen statement naming what the cake contains and, honestly, what you cannot guarantee because of what else you handle in that kitchen, and your storage advice for the cake in your own climate.
  6. Finish with five honest sentences on what went wrong in the bake or the finish — sunken middle, uneven sides, wrong colour, whatever it was — what you think caused it, and the one thing you will change next time. Then add a short compliance plan built from lesson eight: your CAC position today and the date you will register if you have not, checked against cac.gov.ng; one or two sentences saying whether the cake you just baked needs NAFDAC product registration and why, using the made-to-order versus packaged, shelf-stable distinction correctly; what the food handler's health certificate and the premises inspection actually require at your own state or LGA environmental health office, with the date you will go and ask them; and a full draft label for one packaged product you would sell, with every field from lesson eight and the NAFDAC number line left blank and marked "once granted". Hedge anything you are unsure of and name the authority you would confirm it with — do not state any fee as a fact.

Files to work with

Project workbook (fill in, then submit)The whole brief, an evidence checklist, the grading rubric as a self-check and the link-sharing steps in one file. Opens in Word, Google Docs or WPS.Word · 7 KB

How it is graded

CriterionWeight
Ingredient costing: itemised, realistic current market prices with the market named, and correct arithmetic22%
Full price build-up: labour hours and rate, overhead per cake with working shown, waste allowance and margin, and a defensible final price23%
Baking evidence and kitchen practice: crumb photo, method notes, real oven temperature and time, the hygiene habit changed, and an honest assessment of the result17%
Decorating and finish: clean crumb coat, smooth sides, tidy border, usable photograph13%
Order handling and compliance: order-form questions, written quote, deposit and cancellation policy, correct allergen and storage advice, plus a compliance plan that gets the made-to-order versus packaged NAFDAC distinction right, names CAC and the state or LGA environmental health office, hedges every regulatory claim, and includes a complete draft packaged label25%

You need 65% overall to pass. A human examiner also reviews this safety-critical project before any certificate is issued. A failed submission comes back with feedback and can be revised and resubmitted.

Before you submit: make your link public

If your work lives in Google Drive or Google Docs, open Share → General access and change “Restricted” to “Anyone with the link” (Viewer). Then paste the link into a private browser window: if it opens without sign-in, you are ready. A private link cannot be graded — it is the single most common reason a good project fails.

Frequently asked questions

Do I have to finish Baking & Cake Decorating Business before submitting the project?

Yes. The submission screen opens once every lesson in Baking & Cake Decorating Business is marked complete. The lessons are where the methods, the Nigerian context and the worked examples the project depends on are taught.

How is the project graded?

An examiner scores each rubric criterion from 0 to 100 and weights them as shown on this page; you need 65% overall to pass. Because this is a safety-critical trade, a human examiner also reviews every submission before a certificate is issued.

Can I resubmit if I fail?

Yes. A failed project comes back with feedback; revise the weak parts and resubmit. A passed project is final — the certificate is issued and cannot be re-rolled.

What do I actually submit?

A write-up of what you did (under 5,000 characters). You can mention a public link to supporting files in the write-up. The free project workbook on this page walks you through all 6 steps.

Is the certificate real?

Yes. Passing this project issues a certificate with a unique verification code. Anyone — an employer, a client, a school — can open the verification page and see that the certificate is genuine and which project earned it.

More Trades projects

Ready to earn this certificate?

Baking & Cake Decorating Business is free and self-paced. Finish the lessons, complete this project, and the certificate is yours to share.

Start learning free