Food Friday ~ Christmas pudding cake pops

Friday, December 16, 2011

Hi everyone!!  Kylie here with a fabulously festive food friday feature! ;o)  And, after my post is Kim with her FUN scrapbooking “recipe” challenge for you to enter over the holidays…you’ll LOVE IT – plus there are prizes to win too! YAY! (so don’t forget to keep scrolling, we would hate for you to miss out on all the digi-scrapping merriment!)

Today, I’m sharing with you a simple holiday treat that is quite possibly too cute to eat – my Christmas Pudding Cake Pops!  I’ll warn you now, they are super dense and deliciously rich <one is definitely enough for me in one sitting> …even so, they are addictive and will have you wanting more and more!

I’ve never been a big fan of traditional fruit cakes or fruit puddings.  When I went to weddings as a little girl I would always look forward to my little piece of wedding cake…for the thick band of fondant/royal icing, not the actual fruit cake - that got handed over to one of my siblings! ;o)  So this recipe is mainly chocolate cake (my fave!) spiked with a little fruit mince – to give it that festive taste.  Originally I was planning on making these with the lollipop sticks but unfortunately I couldn’t get the sticks in time for the post…there must have been a rush on them and I missed out! :o( So there is no pop in my pops!! LOL!  Not to worry, the lollipop sticks are optional and you can make yours with or without.

Ingredients

• 1 packet of your favourite pre-mix chocolate cake
• 100g (3 1/2 oz) cream cheese, softened
• 1 cup icing sugar mixture (confectioners sugar)
• 1/2 cup of pre-made fruit mince
• 375g (13 oz) packet of milk chocolate melts, chips or prefered cooking chocolate
• 100g ( 3 1/2 oz) white chocolate melts, chips or prefered cooking chocolate
• silver cachous or other decorations
• lollipop sticks

Directions

• Bake cake as per instructions on pre-mix cake packet
• Allow cake to cool and then break into pieces.  Process cake in a food processor until mixture resembles fine crumbs.  Transfer to a large bowl.
• Process the cream cheese and icing/confectioners sugar until smooth.  Add cream cheese mix to the cake crumbs along with the fruit mince.  Stir well until all combined.
• Line tray/s with baking paper and then roll tablespoonfuls of cake mixture into balls and place on tray. Cover with plastic wrap and place in the fridge for 4 hours or until firm.
• Melt milk chocolate.
• Dip lollipop stick into chocolate and then insert into cake ball – repeat with all.  Then dip each cake ball into the melted chocolate, turning to coat (start with the first ball again as the stick should be nicely set by then)
• Insert the cake pop into pre-made holder to stand upright. Repeat with remaining balls and chocolate.  Allow to set for 30 minutes.
• Melt white chocolate and set aside for 5 minutes to cool slightly.  Spoon a little chocolate onto the top of each cake pop, allowing it to run down the sides slightly.  Quickly sprinkle with silver cachous or sprinkles so that they stick to the white chocolate.  Allow to fully set

More information and tips

• Chocolate Cake ~ make sure you have the other ingredients (egg, milk, oil etc) to complete the pre-mix cake.  If you like, you can make your own chocolate cake from scratch…just make sure it’s not a super-moist recipe otherwise it will not crumb when processed.
• Fruit Mince ~ Jars of traditional fruit mince are readily available in Australia (I bought a 410g jar of Robertsons Fruit Mince – which is imported from the UK anyway).  If you’d like to make your own you’ll find some recipes HERE.  As a quick alternative you can roughly chop up a mix of dried and/or candied fruit ~ raisins, currants, sultanas, glace cherries, candied orange peel, clementines, dates, figs, whatever combination you prefer.  This won’t be the same but you’ll still get that fruity goodness with your chocolate pops!  Oh and don’t be confused with the VERY traditional 16th century English fruit mince or mincemeat…which contains meat with the fruit and spices ;o)
• Chocolate ~ Each type of chocolate will melt differently – so follow the instructions on the packet or use your preferred method, whether that’s the microwave, double boiler, saucepan and heat-proof bowl.  My little tip when melting chocolate is to add water to a saucepan to a level that is well under where the bowl of chocolate will sit securely.  Bring the water to the boil (without the bowl on top) and then turn the heat off.  Sit the bowl of chocolate on the saucepan and just leave to melt while you are busy preparing your other ingredients.  The remaining steam/heat under the bowl is enough to melt the chocolate.
• Lollipop sticks ~ and if you do use the sticks then you’ll need something to hold them.  Either a cardboard box turned upside down with holes in the top, florist foam, a block of polystyrene, or you could look for cake pop stands in specialty cake decorating or kitchenware shops, or do a search online.

Here is a little 4×6 recipe card I created as a FREE download.  I used a Shabby Shoppe Muffin Man recipe card template and a collection of Shabby Princess digital kits (see the TOU in your download for more details).

Just click on the image below to download (or click HERE)!

Hope this yummy recipe adds a little extra sweetness to your holiday celebrations!  Thanks for checking it out! :o)

This is where I’ll leave you today (I will be back tomorrow!)  Scroll down for Kim’s exciting new post…

KylieFood Stuff, Free (not desktops), Uncategorized 9 Comments