Cake Pops

I had really been wanting to try my hand at making cake pops for a while now, what with my ravenous, incurable sweet tooth and all.  I was intimidated; it looked super time consuming and adding a toddler into the mix and being hugely pregnant, I just didn't think cake pops would be in the stars for me for a few years.  I also thought that even with my love for sugar that they might be over the top in the sweet department; I have had Starbuck's cake pops and pretty much had to pace myself over an entire day to finish just one because it was so sweet. 

Alas, mom-in-law's birthday rolled around and Janelle had the idea to make cake pops, so I told her that I HAD to be involved and that she HAD to let me blog about it.  Being the nice gal that she is, she let me do both and we had a great time!  It took us 3 hours, mind you, but doing it with someone didn't make it feel that long and we had a blast doing it!  I took lots of pictures to remember what we did - although there are a ton of great websites out there that have great photos too!  It was a huge success and they were super yummy, and didn't have an inch of coating on them like all the other Cake Pops I have seen!  The basic instructions are below.


Cake Pops:


You will need: 1 boxed cake mix, 1 container frosting, melting wafers (we used white and milk chocolate and dyed the white with food coloring), shortening, lollipop sticks


Method:
* Bake a cake, any cake!  (We opted for a store bought vanilla cake, and a brownie mix; you can make any cake you like.  We went the boxed route for ease and time, and also because you need a cake that comes out perfectly moist, but not too moist.)


* Let the cake cool, and then mash with a fork

* Mix approx 1/3 of a container of store bought frosting into the cake (we opted for cream cheese frosting because it is slightly less sickengly sweet); the frosting allows you to roll the cake into balls, add  more frosting if it isn't coming together.  For the brownie, we didn't need to add frosting because it can be rolled into balls without it.


* Roll the cake dough into balls of the same size (a pampered chef cookie scoop does a perfect job!)


* Melt wafers with about a tablespoon of shortening (approx 1.5 cups wafers:1 Tbsp shortening); you can opt not to use the shortening but we highly recommend it; it means that the coating won't be super thick, and putting it onto the cake pop will be much easier.


* Dip sticks into warm wafer mixture and position into the cake balls.  Allow to cool.


* Dip cake balls into the wafer mixture (if you have trouble coating it, heat it up again), and then shake or twist off excess over the pan/bowl.  Put lollipop sticks into floral foam or styrofoam to dry.  Sprinkle with decorations!  Eat!