Homemade Cake Pops

Cake pops! 

The shiny, cute little confectionary placed so strategically in a bakery that every person who passes the shop is tempted by it! They are bite-sized, cheap and so colourful! I simply loved these as a child and every time we went to a bakery I got one of these no matter how many cakes we bought.  They are perfect for kids parties as kids don't get frosting on their beautiful fancy clothes and it looks pretty too! 

Photo by American Heritage Chocolate on Unsplash

Anytime its a special occasion or event and I decide to bake cakes, I make sure that none of the cake scraps get wasted and I turn them into pretty little cake pops! Any leftover batter, cake or confectionary, you can use it all into making cake pops. So versatile and tasty, and they barely take any time to make! no elaborate frosting like whipped cream or buttercream, just simply coated in chocolate and ta daaa! cake pops are ready!

The major difference between the ones you have tried and these are that these are homemade. No pre-mixed cake mixture, this is 100% healthy and homemade. Plus,  its quarantine time so its best to avoid store-bought food as much as possible. When you make these, you will actually feel the difference in taste. Bakeries use the border overbaked portions which don't make it to frosted cakes to make these pops, but the homemade version is much softer and cakier and batter! (get it? batter?) Today we’ll go over all my tips, tricks, and secrets to crafting the peeeerrrfect pop as well as the homemade vanilla cake which you can also find on Basics 101 page. 

Other recipes you might like:

Best Ever Chocolate Cake

Classic Pancakes

Dalgona Coffee

Upside Down Mango Cake

So lets "pop" into it! PS: I am eating a cake pop while writing this.😉

Preparation Time: 30 minutes(includes baking cake)

Cooking Time: 30 minutes(excluding cooling cake time)

Ingredients:

For the cake:

1.5 cups of flour
3/4 cup curd
3/4 cup neutral flavoured oil
3/4 cup powdered sugar
1.25 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
a pinch of salt
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
1/2 cup milk powder(optional)
1/2 cup milk(if batter is too thick)

For the chocolate covering:

100 grams of chocolate(about 3/4 of 150 rupees silk)
toothpicks

Instructions:

1. In a separate bowl sift your dry ingredients- flour, baking powder, baking soda and milk powder. Set it aside.
2. In a blender take oil, yoghurt and powdered sugar and blend it well(about 15 seconds). If you blend it too much the butter from the curd might separate and we just want a vanilla cake, don't we? You could also whisk by hand but it will be much more difficult.
3. Not transfer the blended wet ingredients to another bowl and slowly add your dry ingredients.
4. Using a whisk put your dry ingredients in your wet ingredients and whisk in one direction only to avoid lumps.
5. Once the batter is done add vanilla essence, mix well and set it aside. You could add 1.5 teaspoon of essence if you are going for a strong vanilla vibe.
6. Preheat your oven 100 degree Celsius for 10 minutes.
7. Pour your batter into the tin and tap it twice to set the batter and release any bubbles. I use 8-inch aluminium cake tin, about 2 inches deep.(note: this is an affiliate link. If you use this link to make a purchase, it won't cost you extra, but I might make a little something!)
8. Bake it off at 160 degrees celsius for 25–30 minutes.
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10. So this is how my cake looked fresh out of the oven. you can insert a toothpick in the centre of the cake and if it comes out clean, then your cake is done.
11.  Let the cake cool for about an hour or so. This will help the cake bind later and won't burn your hands too.
12. Meanwhile, you can melt some white chocolate to add to the cake crumbs later. I didn't have much white chocolate, so I melted 3 bars of milky white bars(the 10 rupees one) and I separated the cream of oreo from the cookies (about 12 cookies)and melted it with the milky bars. It gave a nice thick texture to it. If it seems too thick, you can add a teaspoon or so of milk to thin it out. 
13. Note: I used the above amount for half the cake. My cake is a 8 inch one. So keep that in mind.
14. Once your cake has cooled down, cut out whatever amount you want and start breaking it into tiny crumbs. I used only half the cake since my parents aren't a huge fan of cake pops, so I left half the cake intact for them😁😁
15. Once you have broken down the cake into crumbs, add the melted white chocolate to it and mix well with a fork. Save about 2 teaspoons of the white chocolate for decorating and sticking the toothpick in the pop. Fork because it is easier to work with and doesn't stick too much to the chocolate and cake mixture.
16. After mixing the crumbs and cake well, take about 1 large spoons worth of the mixture and shape it well between your hands. if you cant roll it, then just press it firmly to make a ball. You got to eyeball the quantity here a little bit because you want a good chocolate to cake ratio and I can't determine how much or how thick your chocolate coating will be...
17. Place all the balls on a large plate so they don't stick to each other. then get your toothpicks out and dip them a bit in white chocolate and stick them on the pop. The chocolate will harden when you freeze these pops and ensure they don't fall off the toothpick when you dip them in chocolate.
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19. I added some oreo crumbs to some of the crumbled cake for a chocolate cake pop. It is a totally personal choice. You can add hide and seek or even bake a chocolate cake. 
20. Put the pops away in freezer or about 20 minutes or until you are done melting chocolate for the coating.
21. In a large bowl, Take about half a litre of water and heat it. Get another bowl which sits well on top of the first bowl with the water. This will serve as our double boiler to melt chocolate.
22. Now, the most important part: chocolate. You can use any chocolate you like, dairy milk, silk or any, but a rule of thumb is that vanilla cake pops go well with milk or dark chocolate and chocolate cake goes well with white chocolate. 
23. since I made vanilla cake, I used dark chocolate for my covering(because I love it!). Heat 100 grams of the chocolate(its better to chop it up a bit) of your choice over a double boiler and let it melt completely.
24. Take the cake pops out of the freezer and start dipping them in the melted chocolate. It is a good idea to keep the chocolate over the boiler so it doesn't harden before you can dip your pops.
25. Dip the pops, let the excess fall off and put it on the plate. this is a little difficult to do and takes some time so maybe stick the pops back in the freezer if you feel comfortable with hard cake.
26. Once all of them are coated, take them out of the freezer and put them in the refrigerator. you thought I was going to "take em out of the freezer and eat them!" no. not so soon.
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28. This is how mine looked after dipping in chocolate and freezing them. Not the most beautiful, so I coated them in crushed oreos. Improvise.Adapt.Overcome.😎
29. Let the chocolate set for about 30 minutes and if you want, and if you have any left, dip the top in the white chocolate or drizzle them with a spoon. I didn't have any, so I crushed some oreo cookies(the ones whose cream I used), and coated my balls in them. they looked more like fudge at this point rather than cake pops, but I couldn't care less. 
30. After 30 minutes, you can take them out and eat them all you can. Finally. done!

Now you can devour them all you want and not feel guilty about anything! Forget that diet, forget everything and just eat that pop.

Let me know how your pops turned out! 

~Meghana