How To Get Cake Pops To Stand Up

How was your weekend? We spent most of it celebrating my friend’s birthday. I made a whole mess of treats including chocolate zucchini cake (as cupcakes), these salted caramel dark chocolate cookies, and these peanut butter M&M cookies too—it’s been way too long since I made a batch of those in particular! The birthday girl loves chocolate and peanut butter and caramel so these 3 were a no brainer.

There’s no batter time (get it? batter?) than a happy occasion to indulge in your favorite treats whether that’s a birthday, shower, wedding, you name it. My mom and sisters threw my baby shower last month and one of the treats they surprised me with was a HUGE display of cake pops. I love cake pops, but hardly ever take the time to make them. Though I did whip up a batch for both of my sisters’ bridal showers in the past few years.

The difference between these cake pops and others you may have tried is that these are 100% homemade. There’s no box cake mix or canned frosting, which results in a totally unique cake pop experience. You can actually TASTE the homemade. The love, the passion, and the care that goes into creating each adorable pop.

The Best Chocolate Cake Pops

So anyway! I first began making homemade cake pops when I wroteSally’s Candy Addiction. In fact, this recipe is published in the book! I want to share it on the blog as well because I’ve gotten lots of questions about making from-scratch cake pops.

Today we’ll go over all my tips, tricks, and secrets to crafting the peeeeerfect pop as well as the homemade vanilla cake and vanilla buttercream used inside. There’s lots of ground to cover so let’s pop right to it. (Can’t stop with my nerdiness right now.)

Since we’re leaving the box cake mix and canned frosting on the store shelves, we’ll need to take a little extra time to prep both from scratch. I always make the cake the night before, then finish the cake pops the next day. Here’s the general process:

Vegan Cake Pops Recipe

Super basic recipes for both the vanilla cake and frosting, but I do encourage you to use the correct size pan for the cake. This cake is too large for a typical 9-inch cake pan. You’ll need to use a 9-inch springform pan since it rises quite high. Or you can use an 11×7-inch pan instead. A 10-inch springform pan would work as well.

Cake ingredients are straightforward. The basic crew like flour, butter, sugar, vanilla, milk. Same goes with the vanilla frosting: butter, confectioners’ sugar, vanilla, milk (or cream). The difference between this and what you get out of a box is the taste. You can totally tell these cake pops are special and it’s because you started with from-scratch components. WORTH IT!

(Crumbling the cake into the frosting sounds super weird when you think about it and that’s exactly what cake pops are—super weird when you think about it. It’s cake and frosting mixed together to form a truffle-like ball. Pop a stick in it and dunk into coating. Yep, it’s weirdly delicious and awesome and you need to embrace it.)

Cakeball Pops And The Secret To Dipping Anything In Chocolate

It’s easier to roll the cake + frosting mixture into perfectly round balls if it’s cold. And what I do is roll the balls up right after the two are mixed together. They’re pretty misshapen because the cake + frosting mixture is super moist—and at room temperature. So then I chill the balls in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours. After that, I give them another little roll to smooth out the sides. When they’re cold, they’re easier to smooth out and form perfectly round shapes.

Just like when we make Oreo balls, the cake balls need to be super chilled before dipping, so this trick gets both steps done!

Now let’s dunk. You can dip the cake balls into pure white chocolate, which is what I prefer for best taste, but that stuff is pretty expensive. And you need a good amount for all 40 cake pops! You can use candy melts/candy coating instead. I give both options in the recipe below along with notes for each choice.

Winnie The Pooh Honeypot Cake Pops — Poetry & Pies

Another trick: to ensure the cake ball stays secure on the lollipop stick, dip it slightly into the coating first. Then stick in the center of the cake ball. See photo above!

And another trick: the best way to allow the coating to dry and set—without ruining the perfectly round cake pop—is to place them right side up in a large styrofoam block or even a box. I used a box, as pictured below, for this batch. I just poked super tiny holes into it. Easy and cheap.

Cake pops are a genius celebration-worthy treat to make ahead of time because they freeze beautifully. I simply freeze them in a large zipped-top freezer bag after they’ve fully dried. They’re great for up to 6 weeks, then just let them thaw overnight in the fridge.

Homemade Cake Pops Recipe

I have a few more tips for ya! I went over these in Sally’s Candy Addiction because they’re pretty important to review before you get started.

Sally McKenney is a professional food photographer, cookbook author, and baker. Her kitchen-tested recipes and thorough step-by-step tutorials give readers the knowledge and confidence to bake from scratch. Sally has been featured onDo you like to make Cake Pops with the stick up, but end up with a mess on the bottom? Learn how to make bottomed cake pops in Candy Apple style the easy way. This tutorial guides you through the process step by step.

Often, when you pick up the pop, you realize that there is no candy coating on the bottom “foot” of the pop?Well, here’s a little trick that I like to do to ensure that you will get thePerfect Bottom Cake Popevery time!

Vanilla Cake Pops From Scratch

Then place it on top of the candy disk. You may have to hold it there for a count of 10 if your candy coating is thin and the pop starts to lean.

The candy coating will ooze down to cover the disk and hide it and there will be a bit of an extra candy crunch at the bottom, but that’s no biggie.

The good news is that they stand up straight and they have a flat bottom with no hole for cake and oil to leak out of an make a big mess on your serving tray.

Tips For Using Babycakes Cake Pop Maker • Love From The Oven

If you aren’t using Wilton’s Candy Melts, Make and Mold candy wafers, Mercken’s coatingsorGuittard’s A’peelsor any other candy coating that comes in a disk shape, simply crate your own disk with your color before dipping.

Hi. Now that I am a grandmother I need to learn how to bake an edible cake or make cake pops. What cake batter is recommended?

I use any cake mix. I find that they are light and airy and so easy to bake. I just buy whatever is on sale. Have fun making them!

Beach Ball Cake Pops

Yep! This trick should work. Or you can add a dollop of chocolate to a cookie sheet and then rest the dipped cherry on that.

I'm so glad you posted this! I thought I was the ONLY person who's cake pops fell off the stick, cracked, or looks lumpy. Mine never look perfect but I also compare them to Bakerella's perfect cake pops. I can't wait to try it again with your tips! Thanks for sharing!

I saw this a week ago and couldn't remember where I saw it so I stalked Pinterest. This is right on time for my daughter's open house. I'll be making tons of cakepops. Thanks!!!

Chocolate Cake Pops — Salt & Baker

Hey there! Just wanted to let you know we featured you in our Favorite Find Fridays post over at Whimsically Homemade. We used one of your pictures. If that's a problem let us know and we'll remove it immediately. Thanks for your great inspiration!A couple of weeks ago I posted my 5 tricks to make cake pops more easily – ways I’ve found to cut down on time and frustration by using kitchen tools I already had. The post got a lot of comments and feedback, along with some questions about making cake pops that made me realize I skipped the basics for you all who have never made them.

Cake pop recipes can be overwhelming even to an experienced baker, so I  can definitely understand why a lot of you haven’t attempted making them yet. I made a simple step-by-step photo tutorial to guide you through the process and I hope it encourages you and helps you take the plunge into making cake pops. I hated making them at first because it took so much time, but the more I make them (and I keep doing it because they’re so delicious!), the easier and faster it gets.

 1. Bake a cake, any cake (use a box mix if that’s your thing, or your favorite cake recipe). Let it cool, then split it into several big pieces. Crumble them evenly with your hands, a food processor or a blender. Place all the crumbs into a large bowl.

Homemade Starbucks Cake Pops

2. Make the frosting that goes with your cake recipe