Cake Pops

Cake pops have become really popular over the last few years. If you’ve never had one, they’re essentially cake crumbs mixed with icing to form little moreish bites that are then popped on a lollipop stick and covered in chocolate. Everyone knows that putting something on a stick automatically makes it better!

Cake pops are easy but a little time consuming to make. There’s a few things to remember:

• A moist cake works best. My chocolate cake recipe is ideal. Red velvet also works well. I’m not a huge fan of vanilla cake pops but that doesn’t mean you won’t be.
• Candy melts are much easier to work with than real chocolate. Candy melts are not actual chocolate but don’t require tempering like chocolate does. They form a nice crisp coating with no effort. You’ll find them in cake supply shops, Homestore & more and I’ve recently seen them in Dealz. They are also much easier to colour than chocolate and also come in a range of colours. If you are using real chocolate, make sure to temper it so that you get a crisp coating.
• If your candy melts (or chocolate) are too thick when melted, it will make dipping your cake pops hard work. It should flow off a spoon. If it doesn’t, add a little bit of solid vegetable fat (Trex) or a few drops of vegetable oil.
• The undipped cake balls can be frozen in a ziplock bag for up to a month. Just allow to defrost before dipping.
• The amount of cake and buttercream you’ll need will depend on how many cake pops you want to make, how big you make them and how moist your cake is. I used approx. ¼ of a 7″ square cake to make 8 cake pops.

 

Ingredients:

Cake
Buttercream
Candy melts
Lollipop sticks

Using a fork, crumb your cake so that there’s no lumps left.

Adding a small amount at a time, mix the buttercream through the cake crumbs.

Keep adding buttercream until the cake crumbs come together and hold their shape.

Using a cake pop baller tool or just your hands, form equal sized balls. They shouldn’t be any larger than an inch in diameter or they will be too heavy to stay on the stick.

Place the cake balls in the fridge for about 20 minutes or until they are firm. You can also freeze them at this stage.

Melt your candy melts over a double boiler. Dip a lollipop stick into the candy melts (about half a cm) and insert the stick into a cake ball. The candy melts will help to stop the cake ball falling off the stick. Pop the cake pops back into the fridge to allow the candy melts to harden fully.

You should have your candy melts in a container that is deep enough to be able to dip the cake pops straight in, without having to turn them in the mixture.

Dip each cake pop into the candy melts, allowing the excess to drip off. You can encourage the excess off by tapping the hand that is holding the cake pop with your other hand. Doing it this way puts less pressure on the cake pop and minimises the chance of the cake ball falling off the lollipop stick.

You can either stand your cake pops upright in some styrofoam to dry or place them down onto some parchment paper.

Decorate your cake pops however you like. You can add sprinkles while the coating is still wet or allow to dry fully and add a flower made from icing or whatever other detail you’d like.

Let me know if you give cake pop making a go!

Thanks for reading,

Nicole x