Cake Pops!

This one I made a couple of weeks ago, but with moving, getting engaged, and starting the school year I haven't had much time to blog! Check out these cake pops, a trendy new dessert with cake on the inside and chocolate on the outside- what's not to love?! This recipe is simple, but quite time consuming, so beware!

Here's what you need:
-1 box of cake mix (and the other ingredients the box says)
-1 can of icing
-meltable chocolate
-lollipop sticks
-floral foam
-tinfoil
-ziploc baggie

1. Bake a cake, according to the directions on the box. You could use whatever recipe you want for the cake, but I used a vanilla boxed mix and it tasted really good. Let the cake cool.

2. The next step is to crumble the cake. I left the cake overnight, so this was a 2 day process for me. I used a knife and a pastry blender to crumble it up. It doesn't have to be evenly crumbled though.

3. Then you mix about 1/3 cup of icing with the crumbled cake (you can use your own icing too, but I used canned vanilla, and it was yummy!) Leave the mixture in the fridge for about 15 minutes so it's easier to work with in the next step. While you were waiting you can wrap the floral foam in tin foil, wrapping paper, or even waxed paper to decorate it. I also used a lollipop stick to poke holes so it would be easier later.

4. Next you use your hands to form balls about 2" in diameter. Make sure you press them together firmly and make sure it's not cracked.

5. Melt a bit of the chocolate in the microwave 30 seconds at a time until it's smooth. Dip the ends of the lollipop sticks in the chocolate and then insert them into the balls. (The chocolate makes it stick better).

6. Next you melt some more of the chocolate in the microwave. It's important that it's warm enough so that it's not clumpy, but if you heat it too hot then it will be too thick. The chocolate should drip off your spoon easily. Dip the cake pops in the chocolate one at a time. Make sure that you cover the whole thing in chocolate, but be careful that it doesn't break or fall off the stick (I only lost 1 this way!) Then you have to get the excess chocolate off the cake pops so let it drip off, and then gently tap the stick against your hand (carefullly!) Place the cake pop in the floral foam to dry. Repeat for the rest of the cake pops.

 7. Once the cake pops are all dried, you get to decorate them! I used some of the extra chocolate to decorate the cake pops. I melted it then put it in a small ziploc baggie and cut the corner then squeezed it to make the designs.

I think that they turned out quite nicely for my first time! Lots of fun, but very tedious. And just in case you're wondering, they did taste good too, they weren't too sweet.

Bonus tip: I had some leftover chocolate that I had already melted, and couldn't find my chocolate molds, so I poured the extra in drops onto waxed paper, and when they dried I put them with the rest of my chocolate so I can reuse it next time.