It’s now a pretty common progression in my household: when we have cake, we make at least a few cake pops. Now that we have the system down it is easy to make a handful at a time. This time I wanted to see how the carrot cake and cream cheese frosting combo would hold up in cake pop form. Bite-sized carrot cake squares covered in white chocolate? Yes, please! {Mine are technically cake balls or cake squares because I left out the lollipop sticks but they could easily be transformed into pops.}
Just as I did with the carrot cake bars, I piped little cream cheese frosting carrots {naturally dyed with carrot and spinach juice} on top once the white chocolate hardened. The Wilton’s chocolate candy melts are so easy for cake pops and great for when you need colors. In this case, however, I prefer using white chocolate because, in my opinion, the Wilton’s are a little too sweet for the carrot cake combo.
Happy Easter!
- 1 cup vegetable oil {or applesauce}
- 3 cups sugar
- ⅔ cups water
- 2 cups grated carrots
- 4 eggs
- 3½ cups flour
- 2 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp ginger
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1 8-ounce package cream cheese
- ½ cup butter, softened
- 2 tsp vanilla
- 4 cups powdered sugar
- Cake, crumbled
- Frosting, to taste
- White chocolate
- Frosting
- Carrot juice
- Spinach juice
- Mix all of the ingredients together.
- Divide the batter evenly between four 9-inch round cake pans, two greased loaf pans or the equivalent of lined muffin tins.
- Bake the cake at 325 degrees for 15-20 minutes for round cake pans and muffins, or up to 1 hour for loaf pans, or until the top springs back to the touch and a toothpick comes out clean.
- Mix the ingredients to form a creamy frosting.
- Reserve a small portion of frosting to make the carrot toppers.
- Add frosting to the crumbled cake and refrigerate any leftover frosting in a sealed container.
- Once your cake has cooled, crumble it into pea-sized or smaller pieces.
- Mix in the frosting a spoonful or two at a time, adding just enough so that when rolled the cake mixture stays in balls without crumbling apart.
- Roll the dough into balls and then form them into squares.
- Place them on a wax paper-lined cookie sheet.
- Refrigerate them for 15-30 minutes.
- Melt the white chocolate in a double-boiler or microwave the candy melts in a deep glass or bowl.
- Working with one cake square at a time, dunk it in the chocolate using mini salad tongs or chopsticks and swirl it around until the chocolate covers at least the top and sides of the square.
- Swirl it and tap off any excess chocolate.
- Place them back on the wax paper-lined cookie sheet.
- Spoon more chocolate over the top and sides to touch up any areas if necessary and let the chocolate harden.
- Decorate them with naturally-dyed frosting carrots.
- Use a small knife to trim the chocolate edge around the square.
- Refrigerate them if not consumed immediately.
- Divide the frosting that you saved for the carrots into two small bowls.
- Mix a few drops of carrot juice into one bowl, stirring until the liquid is totally mixed in and you have your desired shade of orange.
- Mix a few drops of spinach juice into the other bowl, stirring until the liquid is totally mixed in and you have your desired shade of green.
- Using icing bags fitted with small tips, pipe the orange carrots and the green stems onto the hardened white chocolate coating of the cake squares.
