Cake Pops

I have been seeing these EVERYWHERE! I don't even know where they first popped up...Pioneer Woman, Bakerella, I'm just not sure. But I decided I would join the "IN" crowd and do some myself. There really are SO many things you can do with these. I put them on a stick but I have also seen them done as truffles. The cake options are many, as are the icing options, the covering options and the decorating options. So go ahead and have a little fun of your own, be creative and daring! My boys thought these were so cool and my oldest even asked if I would make them for his next birthday. We wrapped up a bunch and took them to a couple of friends. They really are such a great idea and so easy (minus a couple of mishaps that I will explain as we go so you can learn from my mistakes!)

Cake Pops

(30-40 depending on how big you make them)

1 cake mix (any flavor you like) baked according to the box

1 can store bought frosting (I know, just go with it!) any flavor you like

1 bag of candy melts, any color/flavor you want (chocolate chips will also work, as will white chocolate, peanut butter chips, butterscotch chips...you get the idea)

sprinkles or other decorations

candy/sucker sticks (I got mine at Walmart, they also have them at craft stores)

a block of Styrofoam (optional)

Once the cake has been baked and cooled, crumble it, in a bowl until there are no big chunks left. Now, mix in the frosting until a dough forms. I used the whole container of frosting and my cake balls were a little soft. So, you might want to use a little less like 3/4 of it. Shape the dough into balls. Do NOT make them too big or they fall off the sticks. About one Tablespoon of dough is all you need. If you are going to make truffles instead of pops, go ahead and make them bigger, if you want. Place the cake balls on a cookie sheet and freeze for at least 1 hour. Because I used all my frosting, I left mine in the freezer overnight, covered. This made them more frozen/firm and they worked great. If you want them to be ready in 1 hour, use less frosting. Once they are firm, melt the candy melts in a double boiler or microwave (there are instructions on the bag for both ways). Now, stick a stick into each of your cake balls and dip them into the melted coating. I made sure to get a little of the coating on the stick to make sure the cake ball didn't just fall off. Gently shake off the excess coating (if you don't they will drip everywhere) and decorate as you like. Sprinkles were fast and easy and I loved the outcome. If you are using sprinkles make sure to sprinkle over a bowl to catch the excess. This makes for a much easier clean up and I could reuse all the sprinkles that fell into the bowl. Then stick the cake pop into the Styrofoam to dry. Another reason I loved that my cake balls were more frozen is that it helped the coating to dry really fast, about 2 minutes. If you don't have or want to use Styrofoam you can place the cake pops on wax paper to dry. Wax paper is also what you would use to make the truffles. Now go out and spread the happiness of cake pops!