Cakepops: Top Tips To Make Your Favourite Sweet!
If you’re yet to try cakesicles, cakepops or cake balls, you’re missing an exciting baking trend currently sweeping household kitchens! After making their debut appearance online, with budding cake bakers experimenting with different shapes and textures with leftover cake mix, cakepops soon became its own style of baking, with fans posting their creations in blogs and forums everywhere. It’s best to get your hands on some cakepops before reading the rest of this article, simply to see what all the fuss is about – or alternatively, let’s just dive straight in!
So, Just What Are Cakepops?
It’s really not that difficult to explain; cakepops are balls of smushed frosting and cake, either left over from previous baking antics, or from scratch. If you’ve ever had a sponge birthday cake, it’s literally like pilling all the left overs into your hands and making a ball, using the sticky icing to help it all bind together. The baking process couldn’t be simpler either – bake a cake, let it cool, smash it up into crumbs, add some icing and then shape your creations!
Not only are cakepops a wonderful alternative to the usual packets of sweets we treat our children to, or even birthday cakes for that matter, but they’re so easy to make that they can be given as gifts or accessories for party bags. The best thing about cakepops however, is the level of customisation, not least the entertainment factor of the whole process! Not only can you vary the texture and colour of the cake, but the icing and center of the cakepops are interchangeable too.
In the beginning, it’s all about trial and error, however as long as you can get it all to stick together, your design list is endless. Furthermore, cakepops aren’t just for aspiring bakers either. Because they’re so simple to make, it’s a fun and easy way to keep the children entertained during the weekends or school holidays.
The Recipe
We’re going to be working off the standard recipe for a dark chocolate cake ball mix, and you’re going to need 2 cups of confectioner’s sugar, 8 ounces of cream cheese (softened), 4 tablespoons of butter and 1 tablespoon of milk. Oh yes, and a batch of dark chocolate cake! Be sure to check http://www.makebake.co.uk/cake-pops-push-pops if you have any queries about the recipe.
The first step is to bake the cake, and once ready, leave it to cool down completely on a rack. A dark chocolate cake, especially when baked to the recipe mentioned above, will be pretty moist, which makes it ideal for cakepops. Once cooled, break the cake up into tiny breadcrumbs, working your way through the bake until you’re satisfied.
Whip the remaining ingredients into a separate bowl, and mix until smooth. Next, combine both the cake and the mix, and work it either with a spoon or electrical assistance if required, until both parts are fully incorporated. Take a sample into your hand, and if it will roll into a ball, then you’re onto a winner! Once you’ve made as many balls as you can, start to slowly push the pop stick into the ball, and finish with a coat of icing! For effect, you can even decorate the icing with sweets, nuts, or anything you like!