Let’s talk cake pops! Delicious little bites of cake, frosting and chocolate, all put together in handy little pops.
These are the traditional or original cake pops. The kind made by combining a baked cake with frosting, then dipping them into chocolate.
I have to be honest, I think I prefer Oreo truffle pops or cake pops made with my Babycakes Cake Pop Maker a bit more. That said, my daughters loved the traditional cake pops I’m sharing here today.
Cake Pop Ingredients
They are made from easy ingredients.
- Baked, unfrosted cake – flavor of your choice
- Can of frosting – flavor of your choice that pairs with cake
- Chocolate candy coating (or white chocolate, or other flavors)
- Sticks
- Sprinkles if desired
Make up your cake mix and bake.
Now we have cake. And now we are going to destroy the cake…
Not quite destroyed enough yet…
And now into a bowl. I know some people use a food processor, but this was easy enough, and less clean up than the food processor would have been.
Now to add the frosting. I am not a fan of canned frosting, so it was a bit painful for me to add it, but hey, it certainly qualifies as easy.
I used about half the can.
After combining the cake and frosting it formed a ball of dough so to speak. I think some people chill the dough, but since my little one was napping I had to take advantage of the time and went straight in to creating the cake pop balls.
The next step was to put the sticks in. I prefer to dip the stick into a bit of melted chocolate, than into the cake pop. This seems to help the pop stay on the stick better, which helps a lot when you are dipping them in the chocolate.
I made pink, white and chocolate covered cake pops. I started with the pink. I’m trying to get all of the pink I can in for Valentine’s Day. After putting the sticks into the cake pops, I stuck them in the fridge for a few hours. During that time I taught Grace how to use the dishwasher. A mom can dream, right?
After that I dipped each one into the chocolate and than coated with a variety of different sprinkles. And ended up with cute little things like this…
A few more shots of cake pop goodness. I didn’t have the time to try any of Bakerella’s cute cake pop decorating ideas, it was more a sprinkle and go type of thing.
Cake Pops
Ingredients
- 1 baked, cooled, unfrosted cake 13x9 pan size is ideal
- 1/2 cups frosting store bought frosting, but do not use the "whipped' variety
- 24 oz candy melts, candy coating or almond bark
- 24 lollipop sticks
- sprinkles
Instructions
- Crumble cake into a large bowl and combine cake crumbs with frosting. While you can use a spoon, it often is easiest to roll up your sleeves and use your hands to work the mixture together.
- Form mixture into cake balls, approximately 1” in diameter. Place cake balls onto a baking sheet and place in refrigerator for two hours, or freezer for 20 minutes.
- Working one cake pop at a time, dip the tip of a lollipop stick into the melted candy melts, and then into the cake ball. Make sure the stick is secure in the cake ball. Place cake pop back on baking sheet to set up and repeat process with remaining ingredients.
- Working one cake pop at a time, dip cake pops into melted candy melts. If needed use a spoon to help spoon the cake melts over the cake pop. Tap stick very gently** on side of bowl to help remove excess candy melt mixture. Immediately add a light coating of sprinkles.
- Place cake pop stick into craft block or cake pop stand and allow to sit for at least 20 minutes to set up. Repeat process with remaining cake pops.
Nutrition
Disclaimer
Nutrition information is estimated as a courtesy. If using for medical purposes, please verify information using your own nutritional calculator. Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.
*Update – since I wrote this post, I’ve made quite a few other cake pops as well. Click here to see all my cake pop posts!
Cake Pops With The Babycakes Cake Pop Maker
My daughter insisted on blue and green decorations for hers. Unfortunately she told me this after my trip to the baking supply store. Thankfully I had some blue and green sugars, though not as brightly colored as I would have liked.
I didn’t plan to put these on a styrofoam stand, so I let them sit, cake pop down, to try. To keep with the last minute theme, my daughter requested on her way to school that I put them on a stand. This isn’t the most inspired, but I had to whip something up at home while Grace was napping. Eh, not that pretty, but it held up the cake pops, so it was functional.
So while they weren’t the cutest, the girls at my daughter’s dance studio seemed to enjoy them, so mission accomplished.
Clarissa says
Just finished up making these and wrapping them up for valentine’s day. Ran along a few bumps in the road, but for my first cake pop attempt I think they turned out okay. I used some leftover chocolate cake, so I didn’t have a full batch. So I think I might have put in too much frosting and not enough cake, because it ended up being super duper soft. I put them into balls, and dipped the sticks in the melted candy melt pellet thingies that we got. But even after chilling those overnight and all during the school day, they were still soft and didn’t stay of the sticks well. So my advice to anyone else new to cake pops, try not to go frosting overboard. Even though it may be very tempting.
I couldn’t find any colored chocolate (I wanted pink chocolate for valentines day) at Michele’s, but I did find these “candy melt” pellets. They’re ment to be poured into molds and you heat them right in the microwave. When they cool they’re like a hard candy shell. Sounds great, but that had issues too. It was too heavy for my fragile soft dough, and when I tried to dip one it would all fall apart. So I ended up dipping only the bottom, quickly setting them on a cookie sheet, and used a spoon to carefully cover the rest of the pop, followed by a quick sprinkle shower. So, needless to say, they are very messy looking, not so nice and neat as yours. But in the end, they taste great. And the coating, however messy, hardened and really helped to stabilize it and hold it together.
So anyways, I just wanted to say thanks for giving out such a great, simple recipe for this. I don’t know how you made them so pretty, but kudos for you! And, sorry for rambling on for so long here. Hope you don’t mind ^^;;
Lyana says
Nicely done! Im going to bake this tonight since its so affordable and easy to make. Thank you for the tips ya!
diovian scott says
when u don’t use the pan their flat on the bottom.
Patty says
Just curious why you would use box cake mix and canned frosting? All the pictures are nice but do you have a from scratch version? Especially with the Kitchenaid being a serious mixer.
Christi says
Hi Patty – if you go through the blog a bit you will see that this is actually my least favorite method of making cake pops, and one I rarely use. I’ve been pretty honest about not loving smushed up cake with canned frosting. Here is a recent post with a from scratch pink velvet cake pop – http://www.lovefromtheoven.com/2012/01/07/pink-velvet-cake-pops/ and I also love using my Babycakes Cake Pop Maker (actually my favorite way to make cake pops)… http://www.lovefromtheoven.com/2011/06/06/cakepops-with-the-babycakes-cake-pop-maker-and-a-babycakes-cakepop-maker-giveaway/
Shontel says
This are alsome to make…luv the ideas n pics..!! 🙂
christina says
hey good cakes
Kat Levy says
I think these are super cute! I’m going to make some for Valentine’s Day. You have inspired me.
Kate says
Oop sorry I think u already gave the answer 2 my question on how many. Sorry I missed that the first time thru. Looks like approx 50 cakepops with 2 boxes of mix. Thx again.
Kate says
Great tutorial & pics-thanks a lot! I got a bakepop pan set 4 Christmas this yr and made cakepops that way… Not 2 bad- a lot of ppl I gave them to really liked em. But it took a ton of time to pour the batter into the little moulds, then we had to take the lid off the mould @ just the right time when cooling so the cakepops wouldn’t crack in half, then I think maybe bcuz the cake balls were so fluffy, it was a real bugger dipping them in the candy coating (and tryin to keep em on the stick). I luv the Starbucks pops, so that’s what got me wantin to make em. Thought the bakepop pan set would b a timesaver, but i don’t think it really was- and the pops weren’t all good n gooey n yummy like the Starbucks ones. Sooo- I can’t wait to try ur recipe. I am makin up a batch to decorate all pretty 4 valentines day 2 hand out 2 the ppl I luv! 😀 p.s. Can u freeze these after they r all completed (like in little baggies) & still have as good of a quality product after they’re thawed back out? And wld u happen to have an estimate on approx how many a normal sz box of cakemix will make? Thanks a bunch!! 😀
Michelle says
Can i make my own frosting to add into the cake mix instead of using can frosting? I can’t find them in my local DIY shop. Please advice. Thank you.