Wow! That’s pretty much all I have to say. I wish I was saying it because I made these cake pops without a single hiccup and it was just an amazing experience. BUT I ran into a HUGE problem. I don’t bake a whole lot, but I don’t blame it on my inexperience… I’m not really sure what to blame it. I say this because my sister, my niece, and I all tried this and it did NOT work!! What was the problem?!
MELTING CHOCOLATE
I have melted chocolate so many times before to dip strawberries in, and no problem at all.. it just melted and I dipped my fruit. Unfortunately that did not happen on Saturday when I was making these. I went through 4 packages of candy melts, 4 microwaveable containers. I used a double broiler, the mircowave, EVERYTHING! and still… the chocolate would not melt. It was as if I had overheated it, but it never melted… I took it off the heat, I followed the instructions VERBATIM! Nothing… I gave it one last try last night before going to a friend of mine that is a pastry chef and it worked!! It is not perfect, but I have cake pop pumpkins and that is what is important.
So after an entire Saturday of the biggest EPIC FAIL ever! This is what I got : )
I’m not sure what I like more though, the cake pops, or those adorable mini scarecrows I found at Michaels.
So let’s talk about what I did.
{Supplies}
(I found everything I needed on the walmart cake decorating isle)
– Ingredients for cake and the recipe. I used my sisters, find it HERE (the recipe is for cupcakes, but I just made it a cake)
– Ingredients for the Icing found HERE (also on my sister’s wonderful blog)
– Lollipop sticks
– White Chocolate for melting
– Tootsie Rolls
– Orange food or icing coloring
– Toothpicks
– Wax paper
– Treat bags
-twine
-and anything you want to use for presentation
{Tutorial}
First:
You will need to back the cake following this RECIPE. Don’t put it in cupcakes, just make it a cake : )
Let it cool for a few minutes, and cut it into 6 pieces and move to a cooling rack, if you don’t have one, you’ll just have to let it cool for a few hours.
—–
While that’s cooling:
Make the icing following this RECIPE
—-
Next:
Time to get a little messy. We are going to crumble the cake up. You will want to cut off any hard edges around the edge of the cake before you do this. When you’re done, it should look like this.
Getting sticky:
Now we are going to put some of that icing in the crumbles : ) Don’t put it all though!!! Just put a few spoonfuls in at at time, you want it to be moist enough to be sticky, but not wet. A good way to know if it is the right consistency is you should be able to make a big ball and it hold together, like so…
On to the pops:
You are going to take a small amount and ball it up, rolling it in your hands. Place them on wax paper so the don’t stick to anything. They shouldn’t be huge, but not tiny either. Basically like this… : )
It should make somewhere close to 40
Once you are done with those, put them in the refrigerator while you move on to the next step.
The Stems:
I used tootsie rolls for my stems. It was easy, just a little time consuming. This would be good if you have older kids. : )
I took a small tootsie roll and cut it in half longways on the diagonal.
Since this gives you a type of cone shape, use the bigger end to flatten out and form a stem. Luckily real pumpkins never look the same so make them all different! You can do curvy, straight, anything you want! Here are all mine. I also used toothpicks to make little groves on the bottom part. Oh, and yes, you have to make at least 40!! Plus I’m sure you will eat a few ; )
Moving on:
This is where I ran into trouble and I am lacking in pictures. Mainly because I was screaming at the chocolate and throwing pots and pans in my sink and cleaning ORANGE chocolate water up off my floor. (If you soak your spoons in a cup of water and leave it on the counter… just go ahead and move it to the sink, it could cause a nervous breakdown if you knock it over) – just a tip : )
So we are going to melt chocolate following the instructions on your specific chocolate. The only thing that worked for me was HEB brand chocolate bars. It came in a microwaveable tray.
FYI if it is thick adding crisco is supposed to help.
You will also need to put in your orange coloring during the melting process.
Now, once your chocolate is melted you are going to dip your lollipop stick in the chocolate and then into the cake balls. The stick should be sticking straight up in the air… I don’t have pictures of it cooling, but this is what they will look like once you put the stick in the cake ball.
Keeping the chocolate warm, you will need to let the chocolate dipped sticks harden in the cake balls before moving on. If you don’t… the cake ball will just fall off the stick.
Making the pumpkins:
Now, holding on to your stick you are going to dip the cake ball into the chocolate. Shake off an excess and then stick it in your Styrofoam so that it can dry. If you want the stick to come out of the top of the pumpkin, then you would just put the dipped cake ball on wax paper with the stick up in the air. Once you place it in the styrofoam you place your tootsie roll stem on the top BEFORE the chocolate dries. Again, I don’t have a picture of this step… probably because I was still cleaning orange water off of everything.
In this picture I had put the cake pops in the hay after they dried, but essentially this is how it will look when it is in the styrofoam. They do drip, so you will want to clean that up once they are dried.
(I also had already put the tootsie roll stems on in this picture)
Put them in the fridge when you are done to let it harden. Then you are done.
I put the treat bags over the top of mine and tied it with some twine : ) I also left the chocolate off of some of the cake pops. Mainly because I’m not huge on chocolate and I thought they were cute like that!
Then you can decorate with them. This is why I love them so much. Not only is it a dessert, but it is decoration!!
I'm waaaayyyy impressed! I consider myself crafty, but when it comes to baking, I fail every single time. Your cake balls turned out perfect though, even if you almost had a nervous breakdown along the way. ;)
My daughter and I saw the mini scarecrows at Michael's yesterday and she was smitten at first sight.
gulp, lordy girl you were workin hard and for good reason b/c those look divine!
Your pumpkin cake balls look great, this is a project I have been meaning to try, sounds lie a fun project to try :) ~April
These look so amazing! I want one right now.
Love your blog! New follower.
These look amazing! I am definitely making these for my daughter's birthday party this weekend! I love the whole setup display too! So creative!! :-)
gatheredinthekitchen.com
YUM!! And they're just too cute, too! I'm visiting from the Sugar Bee's "Take a Look Tuesday" linky party, I hope you'll pop by my blog and say hello!
http://littlebirdiebaby.blogspot.com/2011/10/tutorial-tuesday-linky-party-trio-of.html
I also have a linky party every Tuesday and would love it if you'd link up your tutorial, I'm featuring recipes this week! :) xoxo
Oh My Goodness!!! That is insane but the best idea EVER!!!!! I would love it if you would link this up to the Sweet Swap that i'm co-hosting. Just jump over to thestokerkitchen.blogspot.com and visit the button my sidebar to link up to the 3 month long party!!! Can't wait to see it here!
Oh My Gosh! These would be perfect at a Fall Festival! Would you come over to Cast Party Wednesday tomorrow and share these little cuties with us?
Thanks,
I hope to see you there!
http://ladybehindthecurtain.com
They turned out CUTE…and I LOVE the way you displayed them ;)New follower here!
As a Cake Popper myself…I might ask if you were using candy coloring (and not just regular or gel food coloring) to color the chocolate? If you don't use candy coloring it can basically ruin a batch of melts…just a thought ;)
Cute! And for all that trouble, you definitely deserve to have this featured next week! :)
Those are so cute! I hate when things don't go like I want them to in the kitchen! Stopping by from the CSI Project.
Those are too cute!! Thanks for auditioning for OMTWI!!
I'm glad I'm not the only person in the world that had a difficult time with the coating. After hours and hours of work, mine turned out decent but that was months ago and I have not tried any since then. Yours look adorable.
This is so unique and lovely.. Very creative.. LOVE IT.. I would LOVE to have you link it to my linky party going on today – Pin'Inspirational Thursdays over at The ArtsyGirl Connection – TY :)) Link is -http://theartsygirlconnection.blogspot.com/2011/10/pinspirations-pinterest-inspirational.html
These are indeed unique! Creative and delicious. :)
Well done on persevering: the end result is totally worth the effort. Thos e cake pops look amazing: I may even make them for our Pumpkin Party :D
Found you through CSI! How cute are these?!! You did a great job. I love the idea of cake pops but I'm always scared away by how time consuming they can be. I LOVE how you used a mini bale to display them. Perfect for fall!
Very cute!! Great job!
Thanks for sharing!
Come see me sometime at http://www.willcookforsmiles.com/
They turned out great despite the hiccups!! I've had failed baking attempts too girl!!
Thanks for linking up to Show & Share!!
These are sooooooooo cute! They look delish! Would love if you’d join our Countdown to Fall link party! Hope to see you there! Have a great week! :)
http://dixie-n-dottie.blogspot.com/2012_09_10_archive.html
I like the valuable information you provide in your articles.
I will bookmark your blog and check again here frequently.
I am quite sure I will learn many new stuff right here!
Best of luck for the next!
I will try this recipe when my friends come to my home, but my oldest friend, Marry, who is always with me, is going to the UK to buy a research proposal writing service. I will try to make this cake when he returns to our country, and we will celebrate together.
Oh no, what a frustrating experience with melting chocolate! It sounds like you tried everything possible to get it right, but sometimes, these baking mishaps happen to the best of us. It’s great to hear that you persevered and finally got it to work, even if it wasn’t perfect. Your cake pop pumpkins may not have turned out exactly as planned, but the important thing is that you didn’t give up and still ended up with something delicious. Baking adventures like these definitely keep things interesting! Here’s to more successful baking endeavors in the future! Trust best truck repair for top-notch maintenance and tune-ups tailored to your diesel vehicle.