In the Kitchen With Baby Cakes: Bee My Valentine

I posted this last year on my blog but I thought I would share it again here!

have been reading some really cute food blogs. My favorite treat blog is Bakerella. If you have not checked her out, you should stop reading this and look around her blog. Well, maybe check it out after you read this post. :) Bakerella makes lots of goodies, but the thing that really stands out in my mind are the cake balls. I had never seen such cute little things and they didn't intimidate me too bad! So, for Thanksgiving I made two sets of turkey cake pops. They were really cute, but probably not the easiest for this first timer.

A couple of weeks ago I started planning a Valentines treat to send my sister. I instantly thought of the cake pops. I checked out her blog for some ideas but I decided that I wanted to try to make bumblebees.

First, I made the cake balls. I used a dark chocolate cake mix and just some standard chocolate icing in a tub. You can find Bakerella's directions here. The dark chocolate cake mix is the BEST for these! It is so moist! I've tried a few other cakes, but this one is just so much better!

While I waited on my cake balls to be ready to dip, I made the faces of my bees.

My sister loves Junior Mints and since they are flat, I thought that they would make perfect faces! Then I just used some halloween sprinkles I had in my pantry for the eyes. I used white chocolate to secure the eyes. I also used the white chocolate to draw the mouths on with a toothpick. (Toothpicks are your friend when it comes to cake balls.)

I just played around making the faces, trying not to worry about the imperfections!

I had 2 very good helpers!

What happens when you run out of black sprinkles?? The eyes get colorful and you get creative!!

When I told these bumble bees they were going to Nashville, they were starstruck!

Not convinced? Neither was Thomas...

Okay, now onto the cake balls! So, I pulled the cake balls out of the freezer and melted my chocolate. Then dipped them according to the directions and immediately stuck in the wings. (I didn't do the wings on my first few ones and they cracked when I put them in after the chocolate hardened.) The wings were just sugar hearts. Derek actually suggested those!

Don't worry about the mess around the cake balls. Bakerella suggests using a toothpick to score the bottom of the cake ball so that it breaks away from the chocolate drippings easily.

Now, I let mine cool before I added the yellow "stripes" and the heads and stingers. I found that worked the easiest. I melted white chocolate and then I added yellow food coloring to it. When I added the food coloring it changed the texture of the chocolate, but it was fine. I scooped the yellow into a freezer bag and cut the corner off. I was able to pipe the stripes on. If I was more patient, I think my stripes would have looked better. I was just so excited about how cute they were looking that I went quick. I think the imperfections make them cute...

Okay, okay, those are messy stripes but you get the idea!

Moving on, all that's left is to attach the head and then the little stingers. I used chocolate chips for some whimsical stingers. Or just because that's what my husband suggested and I didn't want to hurt his feelings... you pick. Either way, they were a cute touch. I used my leftover chocolate to stick the heads and stingers on and for some minor repairs.

That's it!! If I can do it, anyone can! I think they are adorable. Derek thinks I got a little too into them when I wound up having a little story for all of them. Hey- it happens!