Make something delicious in Minecraft

If I can’t find cows or buckets for the step 'Use each empty bucket on a cow to collect three milk buckets,' what can we substitute?

If you can't find cows or buckets for that step, switch to Creative mode to give yourself three milk buckets or use a cow spawn egg to spawn cows and then milk them.

The cake recipe doesn’t appear when I arrange items on the crafting table—what might be wrong?

Make sure you used three milk buckets (not empty or water buckets) across the top row, placed one sugar in the middle-left and one sugar in the middle-right (not sugar cane), put the egg in the center slot, and lined three wheat across the bottom row exactly in the cake pattern.

How can we adapt this cake-making activity for different age groups?

For younger children let them use Creative mode to place a cake and decorate with carpets and banners while a parent handles Survival steps, for elementary kids guide them to collect the 3 wheat, 2 sugar, 1 egg, and 3 milk buckets in Survival, and for older kids challenge them to build an automatic wheat farm, a cow pen, or a bakery display to showcase the cake.

What are some ways to extend or personalize the finished cake creation after placing it on a block?

Extend and personalize it by building a themed bakery room, surrounding the cake with colorful carpets, banners, and item frames as 'toppings', making multiple cakes with different decorations, adding signs with your ingredient counts, and taking screenshots to share on DIY.org.