Edible Easter fun...

Now that we have the candy coating issue resolved, I have really been wanting to try my hand at cake pops. Here is the process...


First, you make a cake. Cake mixes are actually preferable for this project due to their crumble-ability. Yay me! And yes, I plan to continue to make up words for this post...Next, you let your baby destroy the entire Sunday paper, just to keep him entertained. It probably would've been more entertaining for him if he had two hands to use, rather than the one hand and the long sleeved t-shirt claw. [Side note/fun fact: I HATE the Sunday paper. It's just more clutter to mess up my already too cluttered house. We only get the paper two days a week. They keep calling and offering us great deals to get it more often. NO! It's just MORE paper. Ugh. Makes me crazy.]Then, after digging paper out of Max's mouth, and after the cake is completely cooled, you destroy the cake much the same way Max destroyed the paper. There is something obnoxiously therapeutic about baking a cake only to dismantle it. You rip it into shreds. Yeah, sure, the instructions say to cut into four equal pieces. But the next step is to rub the pieces together until it crumbles all up. Why do I need four equal pieces for this?

Then you add the icing to the crumbled cake. Sorry, no picture of this. Imagine a big glass bowl with crumbed up cake and some icing being glopped in (made that one up too) and then mixed around. Oh, and I made the icing - but that's because I'm a bit addicted to my cream cheese icing and I knew I could lick the beater when the boys weren't looking. Then you make balls out of the cake. My mini ice cream/cookie scooper is the perfect size. No pictures of this either, mostly because touching my camera at this point seemed a tiny bit scary. [Remember, it's cake and icing being rolled around in my hands - messy!]

Then I got out some Peeps too, just for fun.

Next I melted some white candy coating and some chocolate. Now, for whatever reason I thought this would be a fun project with the boys. I am not sure what made me think that a 5 year old and 3 year old would be able to sit and wait for excess chocolate to drip off the peeps on a stick. However, they were good at covering the chocolate with the sprinkles. So, I set out the sprinkles.Next I fed the boys marshmallows (or musha-mawows), to keep them entertained. I should probably work on the entertainment around here, huh?

And, voila - a mere 12 hours after starting the project, we had round cake pops, egg shaped cake pops, and chocolate covered Peeps. You know, after lunch, naps, a snack, dinner, a few loads of laundry, picking up some newspaper, and a few weather warning sirens later, chocolate covered goodness. Nothing about the process was particularly difficult - just time consuming. The cake has to cool completel; the balls have to be chilled; then the chocolate needs to set, etc.

A bit of packaging - little wrappers and ribbon to pretty it all up. We took some of the chicks and bunnies to Seth's teachers and some of the prettier balls to a friend for her birthday.

Some leftovers. Whatever shall we do with these? I have to say that I'm not a huge fan of plain Peeps, but the marshmallows and the crunchy sugar coated in chocolate is a bit addictive!

The egg shaped pops didn't work quite like I had hoped. Once the chocolate is set, you are supposed to paint them with corn syrup (stripes, dots, etc.) and then sprinkle sugar on them so they look like deocrated Easter eggs. Unfortunately, the decorations just oozed off. But, now that I know I can make the regular balls, I'm looking forward to doing so for Max's birthday party treats!

Cake pops from:http://www.bakerella.com/

Peeps from:http://www.yourhomebasedmom.com/chocolate-covered-peep-bouquet-and-peep-smores/