Sweet Little Valentine's Day Cake Balls

When a friend or loved one does or says something that warms your heart, makes you melt, or gets your heart aflutter, you've been given a warm fuzzy. Usually a warm fuzzy is just something you feel, but on occasion someone will actually give you a real warm fuzzy, a pom pom with feet and antennae with a heartfelt message attached.

When I was young I loved to give the little pom pom warm fuzzies to people as a way of telling them how I felt and now as an adult I create edible crafts and share them on my Hungry Happenings blog. For Valentine's Day, I thought it would be fun to make an edible version of these furry little creatures. Everyone I presented them to, loved them which made me feel warm and fuzzy inside too!

Ingredients: (Makes 40 cake balls)

1 baked cake (chocolate, vanilla, or any flavor that tastes good with coconut)
1/4 cup - 1/2 cup white frosting
24-32 ounces melted white confectionery coating/candy melts*
warm fuzzy feet template
4 cups shredded coconut
liquid food coloring - neon pink or red (the grocery store variety is fine)
80 - 1/4 inch candy eyes
optional antenna decorations: red hearts and pink confetti sprinkles**

**Before you begin, if you don't have experience using confectionery coatings, read my Chocolate Making Tips (here.) Each brand of coating has different qualities, some are thicker than others, so I've given you a general idea of how much you should need for this project.  If you have leftover coating, just spread it on a parchment paper lined baking sheet and freeze until hard then keep for another use.

**As you can see in the picture, I created three different types of antennae. You can choose which you like best, or make all three. 

Supplies Needed:

mixing bowl and spoon or a stand mixer
disposable pastry bag, a squeeze bottle fitted with a small round pastry tip, or a zip top bag
parchment paper
baking sheets that fit in your freezer
zip top bags used to color your coconut
optional: #18 mini ice cream scoop (a heaping tablespoon)
fork or chocolate dipping fork

Break up cake into a mixing bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer. Add 1/4 cup white frosting. Mix to combine.  If the mixture holds together well and you can easily form balls, then stop, if it crumbles, add up to another 1/4 cup frosting. Set aside for 30-45 minutes while you make your warm fuzzy decorations.

NOTE: By using a stand mixer your cake balls will have a smooth truffle like consistency. If you do this by hand, you will probably want to mix it with your actual hands to get it smooth.

Fill a squeeze bottle fitted with a small round pastry tip (#3,4, or 5) or fill a disposable pastry bag (either fitted with a tip or just snip off the end leaving a small opening) or fill a zip top bag and snip off one tip. Line a baking sheet with a piece of parchment paper. Pipe your preferred style of antenna making extras as several will break while you are working with them. Once you've filled up your baking sheet, place it in the freezer for about 3 minutes until the candy sets up hard. 

Click here to download the warm fuzzy feet template. Print out template. Set the printed warm fuzzy feet template under a sheet of parchment paper on a baking sheet. Pipe feet using white confectionery coating/candy melts. 

Break up any clumps in your coconut then place coconut in a zip top bag. You may want some of your warm fuzzies to be red, some pink and maybe even some of another color, so color just what you need. Color your coconut by adding 3 drops of neon pink per cup of coconut or 5 drops of red per cup of coconut. Seal bag and shake until coconut is uniformly colored. Add more coloring until you reach the desired shade.

Scoop out 40 heaping tablespoonfuls of the cake mixture using a #18 ice cream scoop or spoon. Roll the mixture into balls pinching together any big seams. Set one ball into melted white confectionery coating/candy melts. Use a fork or candy dipping fork to submerge the ball in the white coating. Set the fork under the ball and lift it out of the coating. Tap the fork on the side of the bowl to remove the excess candy coating.

Set the dipped ball into the colored coconut. Sprinkle and press the coconut all over the ball. Remove and immediately press two antenna into the ball (if you wait, the white candy coating will harden and you'll have to use a toothpick to create holes before pressing them into the warm fuzzy.)

Use some white candy coating to attach the two feet to the bottom of each warm fuzzy.

Use white candy coating to attach two edible candy eyes to each warm fuzzy cake ball.

These cake balls make a sweet treat all on their own, but if you'd like to add them to the tops of cupcakes, you can do that too. For instructions and a printable cupcake wrapper, click here.