Thursday, December 13, 2012

Carrot Cake Balls by Default!

It's Christmas time!!!!  And at Christmas time all my messy-nosed toddlers and pre-schoolers help make delicious goodness for their parents for Christmas.... so we end up with beautiful, festive trays of wonderful tasty goodness, as long as we wipe noses often.

:)

One of our projects this year is/are tiny carrot cake squares decorated with an orange cream cheese carrot .... and green cream cheese stem!


This plate full of plain carrot cakes are the ones for after-school snacks. There will be MANY HAPPY faces this afternoon! I put 36 of these little cakes away... tomorrow we'll frost them with a star tip and pipe the carrot on top. (I showed the lot o' youse how to do the carrot cake squares HERE) My 13 year old buddies Casey and Kathryn are doing that project. Then we'll freeze the decorated mini-cakes until next Thursday when we assemble the cookie/cake gift trays. When I thaw them we'll place each mini carrot cake in a festive Christmas cupcake holder from Wilton that I found at WalMart.

I get a little hung up on presentation at Christmas!!!!

Harry and David have nothing on us!!!  :)

When I do mini cakes, I trim the crust. While the cake is still slightly warm I trim all four sides of the rectangle about a half-inch from the cake edge. Then I cut the cake in quarters the l-o-n-g way... and then in 6 equally distant rows. One cake gives you 24 petite cakes. SWEET.



But then I decided WHY WASTE THAT DELICIOUS CRUST AND 1/2 INCH OF CARROT CAKE GOODNESS????

WHY NOT MAKE CAKE BALLS WITH IT????  WASTE NOT, WANT NOT!!!!

Oh, happy day, that's just what I did. I had Kathryn mash up the cake trimmings (it ended up being about 2 cups of mashed cake just from those trimmings).






We added about 1/3 cup of cream cheese frosting. (Recipe HERE) 





Now the cake and frosting is mashed together. It looks like corn flakes smushed into yogurt... but it tastes like carrot cake and frosting! Oh, happy day!

Now we form them into balls.... Okay, they look like anemic meatballs, but remember, LOOKS ARE DECEIVING!!!


I'm melting pink candy wafer discs (white chocolate tinted pink) because I can't find the huge bag of fresh Hershey's white chocolate chips I bought a couple of weeks ago. I will probably find them in May... Just in time for Mother's Day... or something. But anyway, the pink melts are fine and quite festive, right?

So I'm melting them using the double boiler method, a bowl nestled over a pan of hot (not boiling) water.... stir occasionally.

But you can just microwave them, too.

And then you dip the balls into the melted chocolate:


Cool and eat!  You can also make "cake pops" if you have the cool sucker sticks around, but I was out of them. Oh my stars, these are the perfect cake ball consistency... I don't like gooey cake balls at all. The carrot cake crusts are just firm enough that they hold the frosting in the ball well... without getting mushy.

I'm 100% sold on this idea!

18 comments:

  1. Oh.... hahahahahaha! Cake, mixed with frosting, and dipped in chocolate.

    OH, YEAH, BABY.

    I think I have your address somewhere. I'm gonna start driving now.

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    1. You will not believe how easy these are... Now we need to do one with brownies, not chocolate cake. Every chocolate cake one I've had is gooey and too slimy.... I need substance to balance the white chocolate and frosting creaminess... I'm telling you, these are better than any petit four I've ever had.

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  2. Save some for me, Virginia.

    Ruthy, I too believe in "waste not, want not"! Frugal and delicious.

    Peace, Julie

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    1. These rank up there with those stuffed mushrooms from Thanksgiving weekend. Every now and again you stumble onto perfection: ratio/taste/texture....

      These are all that! I'm stinkin' happy dancing here because I will be the belle of the Christmas balls with these babies and (like Pioneer Woman's apple dumplings...) They're So Stinkin' Easy!!!

      GRINNING!!!

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  3. Cool idea! I never would have thought of this. I would have just eaten those crusts myself! LOL

    I once baked a chocolate pound cake for a cake walk. It was a little tilted, so I cut off the bottom to even it up. Well, it was so delicious that I took off a little more just to eat. And then it looked like maybe, just maybe, it was still a little crooked. So I took off a bit more (and ate it, of course).

    I bet that ended up being the shortest pound cake ever!!! Warning: don't ever get started on slicing off bits of a cake that's not for the family! :)

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  4. I'm with Missy - I would have just eaten the trimmings.

    But then there'd be no cake balls to share!

    I love this idea, Ruthy. And what a great principle to teach those kiddos - something wonderful from scraps...leftovers...throwaways...

    I think there's a Christmas story in there somewhere :)

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    1. We made brownie balls today. Same way, with brownie trimmings, some with nuts, some without, in three separate chocolates: white, milk and dark.

      I'll let you know how they come out. Great texture, though. Delightful!

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  5. After reading Virginia's explanation of babies over at Seekerville this morning, I think we should give the Fresh Pioneer a new nickname.

    She is the youngest around here, right?

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    1. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! She might not come back after I made fun of her calling that little guy the baby... And she could be our "baby" Jan, LOL! I hear ya'! :)

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  6. Ruthy, that's exactly how I make my cake balls. Except i usually have to use the entire cake. My guys love the chocolate, of course--devil's food cake and chocolate frosting, then I dip them in melted chocolate or white almond bark, maybe add some sprinkles. I guess I'll be mixing some up real soon since they requested them for Christmas. I can't believe you mixed the frosting and cake with a spoon though. Hands are much better. And talk about a good excuse to lick your fingers:-)

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    1. Mindy, I have another cold... I'm clearly diseased, it's kind of ridiculous, so I couldn't use my hands.

      Although I used them to shape the balls, so maybe I just didn't think of it! :) What a great invention.

      I'm going to keep playing with these. Develop the awesome power balance between chewy goodness and chocolaty coating!

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  7. This is brilliant! And I love the whole waste not want not angle. Makes me feel very frugal. I'm so glad it's Christmas so I have an excuse to bake like crazy and give most (maybe) away. :-)

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    1. Yes, this works so well! I can have my fancy little cake squares... and make folks happy with the cake balls on the side!

      :) Win/Win!!!

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  8. I'll be baking a red velvet cake today for b-day celebration. My 18 year old wouldn't go for carrot! But maybe I can make some red velvet balls. :)

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    1. Sure with cream cheese frosting and dipped in white or dark chocolate??? Oh, Yum!!!

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  9. My red velvet cake is already cracking and starting to fall over from too much yummy moisture (remember the recipe where I douse it with warm milk and sugar?). I may end up rolling this baby into cake balls! LOL

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    1. Hmmm... So it will work but they're probably going to be mushy. The ones that come from the bakery up here are mushy and I don't like that about them... hence the carrot cake ones being that little bit chewier... and the brownie ones today came out great, too.

      Missy, if you try it, let us know what you think, okay? And if you've drenched it already, then I wouldn't use the frosting in the cake crumbs... I'd just roll it into balls as is and dip. Red Velvet is a pretty choice for these for Christmas.

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    2. Well, it seems the cake will get eaten after all, even if it is shifting and trying to fall off the cake plate. B-day boy ate it for breakfast this morning! :) Yes, I deserve a Mother of the Year award. LOL

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