- Hey, I'm John Kanell
and today on Preppy Kitchen,
we're making cute and delicious Easter bunny cake pops.
So let's get started.
And thanks to Domino
for sponsoring a portion of today's video.
I whipped up a batch of my favorite vanilla cake
from the blog,
there's a link in the description box below.
That's cooling, and now, to make these extra special,
I'm making a brown sugar frosting for them.
To do this, we're gonna want one half of a cup
of brown sugar.
Brown sugar is delicious, but it likes to do its own thing,
so you're gonna want to just press it into the measuring cup
or use a scale.
Half a cup is about 110 grams.
So plop that into a small pan.
We also want three tablespoons or 45ml of water
and a pinch of salt.
My sugar's already melting.
I'm taking this over medium-high heat.
Stir your mixture together while it comes to a boil,
it happens super fast,
and then we're gonna reduce to medium
and let this cook for an additional minute.
We wanted to make a solution outta the brown sugar
and reduce some of the water that we added.
This smells so good.
After about a minute, you can see it's thickened up,
it's a beautiful caramel.
We're gonna pop this into a bowl.
My brown sugar frosting is in process, it's cooling,
the cake is outta the oven, also cooling
and I'm making my fondant pieces right now.
So just a little bit of powdered sugar
is gonna help things not stick for your fondant.
You could also use modeling chocolate if you wanted
for our components,
but the modeling chocolate's tricky
'cause doesn't really harden,
it just kinda like stays somewhat soft.
We're doing our cake pops three different ways.
One.
Plain delicious cake pops,
we'll decorate them with some sprinkles.
Two.
Bunny bottom cake pops with paws and a fluffy tail.
And three, a bunny head.
So the bunny head is gonna be
kinda like my challenge to myself,
I think it's actually gonna be kind of easy though.
The bunny paws I've done before for cupcakes
and they're so easy.
If you have any piping tip sets, this is when you use them.
The back of the piping tip, you use to cut out some paws
and a little powdered sugar will help it not stick.
And you can actually use your cake pop stick
just to push it through, very gently, like that.
Don't worry if you get a little mark
because we're gonna do some more stuff to these paws.
They don't look like paws yet, do they?
Today's video's sponsored by Domino Sugar.
More than just sugar,
your partner in the kitchen for over are 120 years,
ensuring a trusted baking experience.
I love using Domino Sugar in almost everything.
You see this box all the time on Preppy Kitchen.
And it's because I can always trust the quality
and the results I get from using Domino Sugar.
With over 120 years of dedication to bakers just like you,
Domino is the trusted sugar for expert bakers
who know they want the best results every time.
Whenever I open a box of Domino Sugar,
I know I'm gonna get the best results ever.
My brown sugar is gonna have a wonderful, soft consistency.
It's not gonna be rock hard or full of lumps
and it's always gonna taste delicious
Powdered sugar, the same.
And I've gotta tell you that when you're using sugar,
you're not just adding sweetness,
you're also adding softness.
Sugar gives you a softer baked good
with a wonderful mouth feel.
That's the Domino effect.
And now let's get back to those bunny cake pops
with that delicious brown sugar frosting.
Let's go.
I'm popping some gloves on.
I'm gonna color some fondant pink for the nose
and bunny paws.
Fold it together until you have some pink fondant like this.
And now we're gonna roll this out too.
These don't look like paws.
We're gonna roll them out just a bit so they're ovals
and then, once they get the little pads on,
they're gonna look so cute.
Just a quick roll in one direction.
For the pads, you can use small round tips.
this is a 12, this is a 10,
or you could use a straw and that works too.
Now you're gonna pat them out with your fingers
just to make them a little bit larger and flatter,
and repeat the process with the smaller dots
for the little toes.
I'm assembling my bunny paws
with just a little bit of water, it acts as glue,
but only a tiny, tiny bit,
and we're gonna stick 'em on just like that,
and you can press it so it gets a bit bigger.
And continue with the other little ones.
Once you cut your fondant,
try not to let it set out for too long
because it'll start drying
and it'll crack when you move it around.
While it's wet,
you can make these little paws a bit bigger,
you can play with it,
but after it dries, it's set.
Now I'm gonna try and make some ears.
I have an idea of how this should go, but we'll see.
So I'm rolling my fondant out
a little bit thicker this time.
These are bands that give you a guide.
So if you get a fondant roller,
they have training wheels on them basically
so you don't make any mistakes.
This time, I'm rolling it out a bit thicker,
so I'm not using the training wheels.
And let's give it a go.
So we're gonna use a large hole from a larger piping tip
to cut some bigger shapes
and we're gonna roll those out again,
just like we did our paws.
Just give 'em a tug.
Never tug on a bunny's ears
unless if they're made of fondant.
These are way too large,
so I'm gonna cut them down to shape them
because a bunny's ears are way more pointy.
Give 'em a cut and we're gonna shape these out.
I'm using a paint brush just to push down.
These are just a little bit under two inches.
We still have to make our bunny face,
so that's a nose and little muzzle on either side,
their bunny cheeks, so cute.
I found a boba straw in the pantry
and all you have to do is plop those out,
and with some thicker fondant,
when you put them together and round off the corners
with a little pink dot in the middle,
it's gonna be the cutest bunny face ever.
We just have to press the sides down
and a little texture would be cute,
so let's get something for texture.
I'm just using the tip of a fork
to gently tap my muzzle down and get some texture on here.
It's totally optional,
but I think I like the way it looks.
Paws, check, muzzles also done.
The last thing we need is the cutest tail ever.
Grab some fondant.
You're gonna make a little tiny ball
and then either with a toothpick or skewer, impale the tail.
Dip it in a little bit of water to get it nice and wet.
The water is the glue.
And now we're gonna dip this into sanding sugar
and the sanding sugar is gonna make it look so sparkly.
If you don't have sanding sugar, just use granulated sugar,
that will work too.
Look at that, it's like it's covered in diamonds.
(magical music)
(bleep)
Okay, and use a fork to carefully remove
and set it aside to dry.
My adventure in fondant is complete.
I'm actually gonna do some painting on this at the very end,
but these are gonna dry,
and my delicious vanilla cake is cool
so we can make our frostings, start crumbling it up,
and get these cake pops going.
Into a large bowl,
10 tablespoons of room temperature butter,
it should be really soft.
We're gonna cream it up.
I'm gonna plug this in and then we're gonna cream it up.
Get that butter nice and creamy.
Now, our brown sugar syrup is here.
This is amazing.
And it's really a thicker syrup, it's basically a caramel,
but we're gonna mix it in and it's gonna be amazing.
It's a little cold in the kitchen,
so it's extra syrupy today.
We're gonna beat this into the butter
and get it all mixed up.
Hmm, butter and brown sugar caramel, that sounds delicious.
Now we're gonna add in one cup of powdered sugar, in you go.
Okay, we're gonna mix this up until it's nice and creamy.
And if it looks a little dry,
you could definitely add in some creamer milk.
After just a little bit of mixing,
you have this amazing frosting.
Don't tell anyone.
Mm, that's so good.
You're gonna love this frosting.
You're gonna use its frosting on a ton of other things,
trust.
Frosting's done, cake is cooled.
I'm gonna transfer just a little bit of frosting
to a separate bowl in case I need it.
The edges of your cake are just a bit more caramelized,
a little bit tougher than the inside,
and you wanna have the same consistency throughout
so your cake pops are really easy to roll
and don't have any weird parts that come apart.
And now with your clean hands,
you're gonna grab a handful of cake
and crumble it up until it is nice and fine.
I'm doing that directly into the frosting,
but you could do it into a separate bowl if you prefer.
This is in nice, fine pieces like this.
You want them to be nice and small
because the next step is to mix it all together.
I'm gonna use my mixer again, you could do this by hand
or you could use a stand mixer too.
All that reserved frosting's going in,
so I'm using the whole batch.
And right now, the mixer is breaking up
any of the larger clumps that were left over of cake
and just getting it nicely mixed.
Good job mixer.
Finally, I'm gonna use my spatula
and just give this a once over,
kind of press it together a bit and check the texture,
making sure there's no lumps of frosting
that haven't been mixed in.
Oh my gosh, this smells so good.
Smells so good!
It looks kinda like a wet, sandy texture
and that's what we want.
Now it's the fun part, rolling these into balls.
So you want your cake pops to be as round as possible,
but don't worry if they're a little bit oblong
because you can fix that after the first chill.
If you want your cake balls to be exactly the same size,
you can use the scale and weigh them out.
These guys are about 40 grams each, give or take.
I'm rolling my last cake ball.
It's going into the freezer for 30 minutes
or the fridge for four hours, it's your choice,
we need to firm them up and then we can dip and decorate.
Towards the end of your freeze,
it's time for the most important part of cake pops,
and that is your coating.
I'm bringing about an inch or so of water to a simmer.
So I cook that on heat.
While that's warming up,
I have my 12 ounces of melting wafers
and I'm just gonna give them all little bit of a chop
so they melt evenly.
Any kind of chocolate and even chocolate melting wafers
do not wanna get burned.
So, if they're in smaller pieces,
it just a little bit easier.
My water is warmed up
and now, I'm gonna transfer
our white chocolate melting wafers into a glass bowl.
I'm melting these on the double boiler
because I've learned the hard way,
it's easier.
We're working over some simmering water,
the water is not touching the bowl,
and I'm just gonna stir occasionally
and you'll see it start melting.
So I will take it on and off the heat
just to keep the temperature at a nice, low melting point.
I'm adding in a tablespoon of shortening right now
just to thin it out.
It's getting there, but it looks a little thick
and I wanna have a really nice dipping consistency.
You could use shortening, you could use a coconut oil
that's solid at room temperature,
and those will both work to thin out your dipping.
If you stir any shortening or coconut oil in,
make sure you work it in super well.
There can be no streaks left
because those will crack immediately on your cake pops.
This looks really nice, that's a good dipping consistency.
And now we're ready to dip our cake pops.
All right, I'm transferring my candy melt
into a narrower glass.
This will make dipping easier.
You're setting up a little assembly line right now.
You're gonna take three or four of your cake balls
outta the freezer at a time,
get a stick, dip it in your...
(crickets chirping)
melting chocolate.
And then you're going to push it in,
but don't go too far because it'll come all the way through.
We're gonna dip this,
and the key is to get it nice and clean.
Your clean edge comes from tapping off the excess
and getting it nice and smooth.
But between you and me, you only need one smooth side
'cause all of the is have a pretty side
and the side that tastes good.
That looks pretty nice.
We're gonna let this hang out here.
And you might have noticed, I'm using a little spatula
just to catch some of the excess
and remove it from the bottom.
If you want, you can just add a sprinkle of sprinkles on top
and they look super cute.
You don't have to do the fondant bunny situation
or you could do some bunnies and some sprinkles,
it's totally up to you.
Just make sure you add the sprinkles right away
because the shell hardens really quickly.
Our cake pops are covered, the fondant is dry,
we have one final and crucial step,
which is to give our ears a little bit of life
with some food coloring that I just diluted with water.
A tiny little brush of some pink
will do wonders to make these ears look super cute.
Love it.
We're gonna use a little bit of candy melt as glue
and now for the bunny bottoms,
just put the bottom of that tail in some candy melt.
Now we're gonna stick that right on towards the top.
That leaves the paws.
This is so easy as far as the final decoration goes.
You tell me that's not cute.
Tell me in the comments if you think this isn't cute
'cause it's pretty cute.
Aww.
Okay.
That's done.
And now for our bunny face, ooh.
The bunny face is actually something I wanted to try,
so I kind of made it up as I went along.
Let's see if it works.
All right, we have ears.
You're gonna have to hold them on,
and I did snip the bottom of the ears
so that it would lay flat.
Just take away the excess, and it dries so quickly.
I'm picking my muzzle up,
little bit of candy melt on the back.
pop that on.
I have my little nose as well.
All right.
And the last thing I need are the little eyes.
So here, I'm gonna grab some confetti sprinkles,
but you could just use some actual chocolate
if you wanted to.
Look at that, pretty cute.
My Easter bunnies hopped into life
and the boys are gonna love these.
I'm gonna take a bite of one of the sprinkle ones.
That might be the best cake pop ever.
That brown sugar frosting is such a winner
with the candy shell, mwah.
I hope you get a chance to make this recipe
and if you like this video, check out my Easter playlist.