Sprinkle Chocolate Cake Pops | Gluten Free

Sprinkle-dipped, candy-coated balls of chocolate cake and frosting make delightful two-bite treats that are perfect for celebrating or gifting at this time of year!
I made something that I never thought I would make. See those cake pops above? In my wildest dreams it had never really entered my mind to make balls of cake squished together with frosting and put them on a stick, coat them in candy, and dip them in sprinkles. Until. I did. The inspiration for these delightful, frilly, silly, totally over-the-top treats came from a box of goodies I won in a competition on The Sugar Hit (I think of Sarah as the High Priestess of Baking Meets Pop-Art). Thanks to Coles supermarkets‘ new range of baking goodies I had the chance to play around with a selection of their exciting new baking accessories including huge containers of sprinkles, cake and cookie mixes, cupcake papers, and cake pop sticks. Just like baking MacGyver my mind started ticking over when I saw the ingredients before me and new what I needed to do to defeat the evil doctor create baking magic in my kitchen. And of course, sprinkle a little pastel coloured magic into your day!These cake pops also gave me a chance to use something that I haven’t used in about 20 years: a boxed cake mix. It’s not that I’m a snob, just that it doesn’t occur to me to reach for a mix instead of the raw ingredients. I had fun quickly whipping up the cake with a mix because today’s project was all about the transformation of cake to something else entirely delicious! You can of course make your own chocolate cake (a half recipe of this cake without the frosting would be perfect) or use your favourite packaged mix (gluten free cake mix works here too!). Once your cake is baked up and cooled, you need to trim off the edges (they can cause unappetising lumps in your cake and frosting mix) and then crumble the cake. Mix in your frosting, squish and squelch (technical terminology) everything into a truffle like dough and then form your cake balls (this is the fun and messy part). Chill your balls (that sounds rude, but it’s not) and then the fun begins! If you want a great and comprehensive post on how to make cake pops, and how to troubleshoot any problems I have to refer you to my friend Lynn who used to get paid to do this!The most important pointers for cake pop I have to offer are:

1. Make sure you chill your cake balls for at least two hours – especially in our Aussie summer!
2. Once you have inserted the sticks chill them again in the freezer for 15 minutes. Trust me, this step was vital in ensuring that my cake balls didn’t fall off the stick.
3. Hustle, hustle, hustle. If you want to dip your candy coated cake pops in sprinkles you need to work quickly in dipping them in the candy, shaking off the extra, and immersing them in your chosen sprinkles. If you are decorating them with metallic baubles, or other sugar decals you can use molten candy melts as glue instead.
4. Have fun and don’t worry about being perfect! They are going to taste delicious even if they are a little wonky and patchy!

So  get ready to get a little messy and have a lot of sweet fun making cake pops! They’re perfect for celebrating any occasion or gifting to those you love!

Sprinkle Chocolate Cake Pops

Makes about 16 cake pops | Gluten Free

Ingredients

• 1 box of your favourite chocolate cake mix (or homemade chocolate cake) including frosting sachet
• 400 grams red candy melts
• 1/2 cup sprinkles or non-pareils in your chosen colour/mix of colours
• 16 cake pop sticks

Method

1. Bake chocolate cake mix according to directions. Once it is cooked, cool completely on a wire rack.
2. Trim the edges from the cake and crumble up into small, uniform crumbs in a large mixing bowl.
3. Make up frosting sachet according to directions. Add 1/3 cup of frosting and squish and mix into the frosting using the back of a spoon until you get a uniform texture and everything sticks together. You made need to add more frosting if your cake is a little dry. Add 1/3 cup initially and then add 1 tablespoon at a time until you achieve a consistency similar to a dry cookie dough. It should hold together, but not feel overly ‘wet’ and squishy.
4. Form the cake pop mix into balls roughly about the same size. You should probably get about 16-18 cake pops per cake mix box. Place balls onto a lined baking sheet and refrigerate for at least two hours.
5. Melt your candy melts by placing into a glass bowl and microwaving for thirty seconds on medium-high. Give them a stir and then return to the microwave in fifteen second bursts (stirring well in between) until they are molten and smooth.
6. Dip the top 2cm of your cake pop sticks into the molten candy melts and then push them about halfway into the cake pops. Place in the freezer for 15 minutes.
7. While your cake pops are freezing, prepare any decorations you want to use. I put my sprinkles into a narrow glass so that I could dunk the balls completely, and have a few narrow tall glasses ready to hold your cake pops so that you can dry them upright.
8. Remove cake pops from the freezer. Working one at a time, dunk your cake pops into the candy melts, swirl to coat the pop completely, shake off any excess candy melt mixture, and then dunk and swirl in the sprinkles.
9. Place the cake pops (pop side up) into the tall glasses to dry completely. Once the pops are completely dry they are ready to devour! Or wrap them up nicely and gift them to friends and family.