Cake pops recipe

Cake pops are the new macaroons which were the new cupcakes, or something. Anyway they are super easy to make and very delicious to eat.



Credit: BBC

Here is the recipe for cake pops from our July meeting.

Ingredients:
Cake: this recipe uses 1 chocolate sponge made in a loaf tin, but this could be replaced with any sponge or fruit cake. You can either make a cake or buy a ready made sponge (shh no one will ever know).

Icing: this recipe uses chocolate fudge butter icing but you could use any thick, spreadable icing or frosting. Again you could make your own or buy ready made.

Chocolate, melted: we used white chocolate.

Sticks: we used white chocolate Mikados but you could use lollipop sticks or candy sticks. In fact Mikados turned out to be a bit unsuccessful with warm hands as they snapped so don't use them!

Decoration: sprinkles, sparkles, whatever takes your fancy

Method

1. Bake cake and leave to cool completely. Or take cake out of packaging!

2. Cut crusts off of cake. This will ensure there are no lumps in your finished cake pops.

3. Crumble the sponge into a bowl. The finer the sponge the better. You could use a food processor to do this, your hands or a knife.

4. Add a tablespoon of icing to the sponge crumbs and mix with your hands. Keep adding one spoonful of icing at a time until the mixture comes together in a dough like consistency and forms one large ball. Too little icing and the mixture won't hold together, too much and it will be sloppy. This is a crucial stage!

5. Refrigerate for at least half an hour.

6. Now roll ping pong sized balls of cake mixture and place onto a lined baking sheet.

7. Refrigerate for at least half an hour.

8. Break the white chocolate into an oven proof bowl and put into the microwave on 20 second blasts until melted. Be careful not to over cook or the chocolate will separate.

9. Put a blob of melted chocolate on the end of a stick and push into a cake ball. Do this for each cake ball and leave the chocolate to dry. This will only take a minute or so and the chocolate will act like glue to hold the stick in place.

10. Now dip each cake ball into the melted chocolate ensuring an even coverage. Stand the cake pop upright to dry - you could use a cup, jam jar, floristry oasis, whatever you have to hand.

11. Before the chocolate dries add your decorations. For inspiration google 'cake pops' there are hundreds of pages of inspiration. If in doubt hundreds and thousands look quite nice.

12. Sit back, feel smug at your baking wonder and eat cake pops.

Old skool rules

Jessica Johnson used to work on the WI Life magazine. She now publishes her own blog The Vintage Cake Spot among other things.

Check out these very useful vintage WI cookery tips she has discovered and then visit her blog for more vintage wonder.

"During the research of The Vintage Teatime, that I’ve been only too happy to soak up the chapters on ‘Culinary’ or ‘Cookery’ Hints which were a mainstay of self-published cook books by the WI over the last sixty years. More time-saving ways with potatoes, milk, eggs and pretty much all cupboard staples available to the home-cook in her respective decade. Here’s the best of the bunch…

CABBAGE To prevent cabbage boiling over, add a small piece of dripping or lard. Adds good flavour, too.

CAKE tins. When buying new cake or meat tins, run them inside out with a little lard, then put into a cool oven for an hour or two. This prevents rust and cakes will turn out without sticking.

EGGS you’re doing the separating thing and you drop some shell. Rescue little shards with a large piece of egg shell which acts as a magnet cum lifeguard.

PANCAKES and Yorkshire puds get even tastier with 2ozs of butter thrown into the batter before cooking.

PEARS are much improved by being cooked in a little lemonade rather than water. Think Nigella and her cola ham.

MINT for your summer mojitos can be chopped much more quickly and finely with a pinch or two of sugar in the mix.

ORANGE peel dried and hung up in a paper bag can be used as an excellent flavouring stewed with dried fruit.

REVIVE a drooping lettuce by standing its roots in a little water

THICKENING Put flour in a jar and bake in a slow oven until it just starts to change colour. When cool this can be stored and used for thickening sauces and gravies as it won’t turn lumpy upon adding to hot liquids. What a relief – that’s the white sauce sorted"

(source: the vintage cake spot)