These delicious, bite-sized treats are made with chocolate cake and frosted in white chocolate.
They’re so good they even look like their big, fluffy counterparts from Starbucks.
How Much Chocolate Cake Do You Need For This Recipe?
The amount of chocolate cake needed to make these tasty treats is pretty small – one cup (240 grams) should be enough.
If it’s not quite enough, feel free to add another cup to your baking pan until all the batter is used up.
If you’re making more than two dozen, then you can double the amount of chocolate cake used in the recipe below.
What Kind Of Chocolate Did You Use?
We used Ghirardelli baking bars because we wanted our cake pops to be very rich, but not too sweet.
You can also use Hershey’s Special Dark Chocolate if you’d like.
Just keep in mind that it will have stronger cocoa flavor than regular dark chocolate (which is what we used).
You’ll find Ghirardelli baking bars at most grocery stores, drugstores, bakeries, and specialty food shops.
If you don’t see them on your local shelves, though, check online retailers such as Amazon or eBay where they often sell out quickly.
How Long Did It Take You To Make The Cake Pops?
It took me about an hour and 20 minutes to bake my first batch of cake pops, including time for resting and chilling before I started decorating.
Once I got into it though, things went much faster than I expected.
With practice, this process takes less than 30 minutes per layer (including baking time).
- Ingredients:
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter at room temperature
- 3 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped
- 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 1/8 cups all purpose flour
- 1/4 cup granulated sugar
- 1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
- 1 tablespoon cocoa powder
- 2 large eggs, beaten
- 1/2 cup mini semi sweet chips
- White Chocolate Frosting Instructions
What Was Your Favorite Part Of The Recipe?
Making the cake pop molds is fun and easy enough for kids to do on their own.
I love how the white chocolate coating looks like whipped cream.
The only tricky part about this recipe is chilling the cupcake batter before baking, which can be done overnight if needed.
Otherwise, the rest of the process is pretty simple.
- Chill the cake mix thoroughly.
- Pour into the mold and bake (or microwave) until toothpick inserted comes out clean.
- Let cool completely.
- Invert onto wax paper and chill again.
- Frost with white chocolate glaze.
What Did You Think Of The End Result?
The end product is pretty impressive.
The fact that it’s all baked up into little balls and then dipped in white chocolate makes for some seriously decadent looking cakes.
I’m not sure if I’d be able to eat one whole thing (I can’t imagine eating more than two), but these would make for an excellent dessert.
Would You Recommend This Recipe To Others?
I absolutely love these cake pops – I’ve tried several different recipes and each one is super easy to follow and turns out perfectly every time (even if it takes me 20 minutes longer than usual).
The best part about making them yourself is that you can customize your own creations by adding whatever ingredients you have on hand.
You don’t need any special equipment either because everything can be done with a few common kitchen tools.
In fact, most of what you’ll need is probably already sitting around your house waiting for another use.
What Are Some Other Recipes You Would Like To Try?
You can also make these at home if you want to get creative with your own favorite flavors of cake pop.
You might choose strawberry or lemon instead of vanilla bean flavor since those two are among our favorites.
Or maybe you’d prefer mint chip or coconut cream.
If you love baking but don’t have much experience doing it, check out our Baking 101 guide.
It will help you learn how to bake cakes, cookies, muffins, pies, cupcakes, brownies, and more without having any previous knowledge about cooking.
There’s no limit on what kind of toppings you could put on top of your cake pops either.
If you’ve got an adventurous palate, you can go wild and experiment with different kinds of candied fruits, nuts, sprinkles, crushed candy bars, or anything else you think would be fun.
What Are Some Tips For Making Perfect Cake Pops?
You want your cake pop to be smooth on the outside while still having a nice crumbly texture inside.
You can do this by using a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment (or hand mixers) and beating the batter until it is completely combined but not overbeaten.
That will help ensure there’s no loose flour left in the batter.
Once your mixture has been thoroughly mixed together, transfer it into an ice cream scoop and place them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
Once all of your scoops have been placed onto the pan, use your hands to gently press down each one into a flat disc shape.
The discs should be about 1/4 inch thick at most.
The reason why we used small scoops instead of large ones was because we wanted our cakes to hold up better when being dipped in melted chocolate.
It also helps keep the amount of air out of the cake pop that way.
These little discs don’t need much room around them since they’ll bake up pretty dense once they’ve hardened off.
To make sure that the tops of the cake pops aren’t too domed, we suggest placing them upside down on top of another baking sheet after they’ve cooled off completely.
If you don’t have two sheets, however, you can line a cookie sheet with wax paper.
Place the cake pop on top of the wax paper and then flip it right side up onto the baking sheet.
Be careful not to let any moisture get underneath the wax paper or the cake might stick to it.
When you’re ready to dip your cake pop, melt some chocolate chips and set aside.
Then heat up a medium saucepan filled halfway with vegetable oil and bring the temperature up to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
When the oil starts to bubble, carefully lower the cake pop into the hot oil.
Use a slotted spoon to remove it when it reaches 150 degrees F and then allow it to cool completely before dipping it again.
Chances are if you haven’t done it yet, you may need to practice a few times before getting the hang of how long it takes to cook your cake pops.
But once you know what works best for you, you won’t have to worry about overcooking them.
After removing it from the hot oil, immediately drop it into the bowl of melted chocolate, coating both sides evenly.
Set it back onto the baking sheet and wait for the excess chocolate to harden before moving on to the next step.
Next, take the remaining cup of melted chocolate and pour it onto a piece of parchment paper.
Using a fork, drizzle lines across the surface of the chocolate.
As you go, start adding sprinkles or nonstick cooking spray to the chocolate between the lines to prevent sticking.
After letting the chocolate set up, peel away the parchment paper.
Your cake pops are now ready to serve!
How Did You Store The Cake Pops?
We used an insulated cooler to keep them fresh until we had time to eat them.
We also put them on wax paper under our kitchen countertop fan (that way it was easy to grab one when needed).
Did You Have Any Leftovers?
You’ll get plenty of leftovers for this recipe if you want to make more than one batch.
The frosting is pretty easy to make in advance.
You can keep it refrigerated until you need it.
If you want to use it right away, however, take care not to overmix the cream cheese mixture.
Overly whipped cream cheese will break down and become grainy rather quickly.
To avoid this, blend gently when adding the powdered sugar and vanilla extract.
Equipment
- electric hand mixer
Ingredients
- 15 oz box chocolate cake mix
- 1/3 cup vegetable oil
- 3 eggs
- 1 1/4 cup water
- 2 tbsp Pillsbury creamy supreme chocolate fudge frosting
- 12 oz Wilton chocolate candy melts brown 1 bag
- 1 teaspoon melting aid
- 1 bottle white nonpareils
Instructions
- 1 package chocolate cake mix, 1 1/4 cup water, 1/3 cup vegetable oil, and 3 eggs should be combined in a large mixing bowl.
- To combine all of the ingredients, use an electric hand mixer.
- Spray a 913 inch baking pan with nonstick spray, then pour in the cake batter.
- Bake for 30-35 minutes at 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Carefully turn the cake out onto a cooling rack to cool completely.
- Remove the entire outer layer of the cake with a knife. The outside of the cake tends to be pretty dry, so keep those dry pieces out or your cake pop will fall apart.
- Once the cake has been trimmed, begin crumbling it into a large mixing bowl. Make sure the crumbs are as fine as possible.
- Next, mix in about 2 tbsp of Pillsbury chocolate fudge frosting with the cake crumbs. (For this step, use clean hands).
- Form a ball out of the cake crumbs. Then compress it in a cake pop former, also known as a meat baller.
- As you pull it out, you’ll notice a fine line running across the cake ball. This is the point at which the cake pop will fall apart. The cake pop former’s main purpose was to get the perfect size down.
- So, take the cake ball in your hands again and roll it out.
- Next, place about 1/4 cup of chocolate candy melts in a small bowl and microwave in 10-second increments until melted.
- Now, dip the end of each cake pop stick into the melted candy and insert it about halfway into the cake ball.
- Before dipping the cake pops into the melted candy, freeze them for about 15 minutes to help the stick stay in place. If you freeze them for more than 15 minutes, they will become too cold. When they are too cold, the chocolate hardens too quickly after dipping and the sprinkles do not adhere to it.
- Place the cake pops in a styrofoam block for about 30 minutes to set. At room temperature, serve.
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My blog is all about creating delicious meals with ingredients that are easy to find in your local grocery store. I’m passionate about making yummy meals that I can share with my friends and family.