Cupcake Bites

Cupcake Bites (aka Beth's Blue Balls to my really mature awesome friends!) 

One of the first baking blogs I stumbled upon was Bakerella. Her site is AMAZING, and I've found great recipes, ideas and baking tips there. One of the coolest things Bakerella does is make bite sized treats- Cake Balls, Cake Pops, and Cupcake Bites. Me being the underestimating overachiever that I am, I skipped right to the more difficult Cupcake Bites...and I didn't take her suggestion to use a boxed cake mix and canned icing...no...I used two of her recipes and made them from scratch.

I used her Red Velvet Cake and Cream Cheese Frosting recipes. They turned out great..except i didn't have much red food coloring left, so mine turned out to be more like Pink Velvet cake. The frosting was great as well...and I only used about half of what I made in this recipe.

Putting the Cupcake Bitess together was the most time consuming part, full of trial and error. I made my cake balls too big the first time around, so then I tried to downsize a bit to get the right proportions.Trying to get the right amount of chocolate in the candy mold also took some trial and error, as did the dipping process for the cupcake "icing". I also discovered that 3 year old hands, while mighty cute, slow this process down ten fold!!

All in all, the cupcake bites turned out better than I imagined, and better than I expected when I started mixing them. The mixture looked like this:

Looks an awful lot like hamburger, doesn't it. A lovely thought when you're trying to make something sweet! The consistency also wierded me out a bit as I was rolling the balls, I couldn't imagine that they would be appetizing at all. I'm big on consistency and texture. Ask my family...the bunch of carnivores wonder why I don't care for red meat...it's all about the texture!

Meatballs anyone?? April fool's in August...these are the beginnings of my Cupcake Bites!! Like I said..not very appetizing at first! The picture taking stopped there, as Ben got involved..So here are the recipes and instructions. I'm glad I didn't follow my instinct at this point and pitch them, because they taste great!

Red Velvet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting adapted from Bakerella

2 1/2 cups all purpose flour

2 cups sugar

1 Tablespoon cocoa

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking soda

2 eggs

3/4 cups vegetable oil

1 cup buttermilk (or 1 cup milk mixed with 1 Tbsp vinegar, shaken well)

1 Tablespoon vinegar

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 oz. red food coloring

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour a 13" x 9" pan. Gently whisk the eggs in a medium sized bowl until just blended. Add the remaining wet ingredients, and stir until combined. In a larger bowl, whisk all dry ingredients until they are combined well. Add wet ingredients to dry, and mix on medium speed with an electric mixer until completely combined. Pour batter into pan and bake at 350 for about 40 minutes, or until the cake passes the toothpick test!

Let cake cool in pan for 20 minutes, then turn out onto cooling rack. I wrapped my cake in plastic wrap at this point, but I think it made the cake *too* moist for the rest of the process.

While the cake is cooling, make your frosting.

8 ounces cream cheese, softened

2 sticks butter, softened

1 tsp vanilla

4 cups sifted powdered sugar

Beat cream cheese and butter on high with electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add sugar, 1 cup at a time until well blended. Scrape the sides of your bowl often. Add vanilla and continue to beat until frosting is smooth.

Now for the assembly. I STRONGLY suggest (emphasis on STRONGLY) you look at Bakerella's page about the cupcake bites. Her pictures are much prettier than mine, and since this is her creation, she knows what she's talking about. I don't! This was my first attempt at these little creatures!

What you'll need for the cupcake bites:

1 13x9 cake, baked and cooled

1 recipe frosting ( or 1 can if you choose to go that route)

Chocolate chips or brown candy melts (for the bottom of your bites)

Colored Candy Melts (for the top of your bites)

Candy molds

Sprinkles, Jimmies, or whatever decorations you'd like

Ok, here we go.

• 
  
  Crumble the cake into a large bowl until light and fluffy
• 
  
  Mix with 1/2 the frosting if using the above recipe, or 1 can of packaged frosting
• 
  
  Use a large spoon to mix well..this part is a little tough..and it looks unappetizing
• 
  
  Roll mixture into quarter sized balls- just slightly smaller than the diameter of your candy molds
• 
  
  Pop into the freezer for a few minutes to harden, but don't freeze
• 
  
  Melt your chocolate chips or brown candy melts according to package directions
• 
  
  Fill your candy molds 1/3 full with melted chocolate
• 
  
  Press a cake ball into each mold, pressing until the chocolate begins to squeeze up around the edge
• Place back into freezer just long enough for chocolate to set
• Carefully remove each piece from the mold by pulling up on the cake ball
• Melt your colored candy melts according to package directions
• Dip each ball into melted candy, twisting to ensure the cake ball is covered
• Top with sprinkles, jimmies etc. before candy hardens
• Refrigerate until ready to eat

Enjoy..and if you have friends like mine, don't bring out Blue Cupcake Bites after large amounts of alcohol have been consumed..Inappropriate comments and photos will ensue..and as much as I love my friends and their comments and the pictures, I can't post them here!!