Pumpkin Gingerbread Cake Pops

Every time I decide to browse through TasteSpotting, I am always baffled by the beautiful pictures and amazingly creative recipes selflessly donated by thousands of people all over the world. I know the internet clearly has it flaws, but I just find it fascinating how a simple necessity such as food can bring so many people together and we have the ability to do it from the comfort of our homes or offices or even libraries. That being said, I spent literally about 4 hours drooling over recipes and blogs found through TasteSpotting, when I came across Halley's blog, Blunder Construction, and this wonderful idea for Pumpkin Gingerbread cake balls. I adapted the recipe slightly and turned them into cake pops for my boyfriend's family reunion coming up. I've tried them and based on the results, I'm 100% sure they will be a huge hit!

pumpkin gingerbread cake pops.

cake.

2 cups flour
1 tablespoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 large egg
2/3 cup sugar
1 cup pumpkin puree
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup unsulphured molasses
1/2 cup water

1/4 cup cream cheese frosting (I used store bought)

coating and pops.

1 Bag White Melting Chips (or White Melting Bark)
1/2 tsp vegetable oil
2 Graham Crackers crushed (for topping)

50-60 lollipop sticks (I prefer NOT to use the plastic ones, they slide off too easy)

Large block of craft flower foam

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour a 9X13 inch baking pan.

2. Combine flour through salt in a mixing bowl. Set aside.

3. Beat egg, sugar and pumpkin in mixer with paddle attachment.

4. Add oil, molasses and water and continuing beating until thoroughly mixed.

5. Add flour mixture into wet ingredients in segments until fully incorporated.

6. Pour mixture into greased baking pan and bake for *25-45 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean.

*Halley's recipe says 45 minutes but mine was finished in 25 minutes, so I would keep a close eye on it so it doesn't burn.

7. Using two forks, break up cake into crumbs. Transfer to a large mixing bowl.

8. Add Cream Cheese frosting and mix until thoroughly combined.

9. Form mixture into 1.5" balls and lay on baking sheet.

10. Melt a few of the white chocolate chips in the microwave for 30 sec to one minute.

11. Dip one end of the lollipop stick into the melted chocolate and then place in cake ball. Repeat for all of the balls. Let sit in refrigerator about 10 minutes or until the chocolate is set.

12. Melt the remaining chocolate in the microwave and coat each cake pop with the chocolate. Dip the top of each cake pop into the graham cracker crumbs.

13. Place each pop stick into the craft foam. Place foam in fridge and allow to set (about 20 minutes).

*For pictures on creating cake pops and for what a cake pop should NOT look like, read my other cake pop posts.

Baby Shower Cake Pops

So my oldest sister is pregnant with her first daughter and obviously my soon to be niece. I am so incredibly stoked for her and to meet the new baby Hadlow. Her best friend and sister-in-law set up a beautiful baby shower in New York City so I decided to contribute and try my hand at cake pops again.  They turned out MUCH better than the first time.  This time instead of using an entire can of frosting, I only used about 3/4 of a can.  I put the melted chocolate in a pastry bag with a thin tip to decorate and they turned out pretty awesome...if I do say so myself.

The baby shower gang.  My sister is so cute...you can barely tell she is preggers:

On that note, I know I've been MIA for a while but I've been going through some major changes lately.  I quit my very stable, well paying job in Washington, D.C. to go back to school for Nursing.  I moved up to Altoona, Pa which is quite the change, let me tell you.  I don't know anybody in this town and I am surrounded by mountains like I'm trapped in a valley of slightly odd people.  The program is 16 months and I will have my Bachelors in Nursing and then it is off to school again for my masters so I can ultimately become a Nurse Practitioner.  I'm looking forward to my new niece and there are a lot of exciting changes to come so forgive me if my entries take a vacation for a while, I'll do my best.  

Pink Not-So-Cakey Cake Pops

There is this phenomenon all over the internet that I've been running into called Cake Pops.  Despite bloggers' warnings of being time consuming and messy, I had to try them for absolutely no reason at all.  I read the instructions on multiple sights and thought "Cake Pops? Piece of cake...piece of crumb. Cake."  Needless to say, I should have taken my fellow bloggers' advice because for a project I thought would take me a couple hours tops, ended up taking me two days.  Now granted, I took some 'lessons learned' away and I don't think it will take me nearly as long as it did this time if I make these again.  Before I start my rant, I am going to refer you to Bakerella.  She is the mastermind behind this phenomenon and her cake pops are perfect and absolutely adorable.  You can find the recipe on her website and a lot of inspiration for different ideas of decorating.

Of course I had visions of beautiful pink and green and brown cake pops, perfectly spherical with intricate little decorative details (perfect little polka dots, eye catching 'splatters', and willy wonka swirls) and then adorable little polka dot ribbon bows for the finishing touch. My effort would be flawless; neatly coating little cake balls with brightly colored chocolate. Why is it that my visions are always so far from reality?
                      
                The reality of my perfect cake pop looked like this:

If you would like to hear the reality of the situation, it went something like this: I used one whole can of icing as all of the instructions I read said,  but the 'dough' seemed awfully mushy.  I had a sinking feeling that it wasn't right but then decided that all the time it would spend in the refrigerator would surely firm them up.  I guess the instructions didn't say to eat chunks of cake as you were mashing it into crumbs...hmmm.

Eating this...

will brutally shatter your vision of perfect cake pops.

They also didn't say that the batter needed to go into the refrigerator BEFORE making the balls as I did with mine.  Anyway, after letting the dough chill for about an hour, I tried making the cake balls but they kept sticking to my hands after I'd make a few, so back into the refrigerator the dough went until it was chilled enough that I could make about 5 more cake balls.  Repeat this step for a few hours...that is what my Saturday afternoon consisted of.  Finally, after the balls were made, I chilled them for a few more hours as the recipes said.

Gooey cake batter, does not a perfect cake ball make.

I then coated the ends of my lollipop sticks in chocolate before inserting them into the cake balls...simple right? Nope.  The chocolate dripped down my fingers and the lollipop stick and when I inserted them into the cake balls, the cake ball batter was still too mushy and it squished the balls so they had flat heads.  Then I chilled them again for a few more hours thinking they would surely be firm enough but once again, I was wrong. First off, when I tried to coat the cake balls, some of them actually fell off into the chocolate leaving chunks of cake batter in my chocolate. Secondly, for whatever the reason, the green chocolate clumped up in the microwave and burned to the sides (even though I put it in for 30 seconds at a time as the instructions read...the pink and brown didn't do this).  And then when I tried to decorate them, I didn't have one of those squirt bottles so I used a zip lock bag, but I cut the hole too big so my decorations were a disaster.  Not to mention, I had drops of now hardened chocolate all over the counter, my hands and my styrofoam stand.  Eventually I gave up for the day and only finished about 15 of them.  The next day I went to put the little bags on them and ribbon them up, but my roll of ribbon only covered about 7 of them.

So needless to say, my first cake ball experience was quite the disaster...but knowing what I know now, I think I might be able to make them work the next time.