Carousel Cookies & Balloon Cake Pops

Carousel-themed parties seems to be all the rage these days. And interestingly enough, I still have yet to make my first carousel cake!! One of these days...but I did get to make carousel horse cookies and some balloon cake pops for this Amusement Park-themed dessert table. 

Amusement Park Dessert Table*

First up, the cake pops. The cake pops are made of strawberry cake, swirled with some vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream. I rolled them into oblong shapes instead of the usual round, so they would look more like balloons. I also decided to add some teeny micro marshmallows cut in half and squished, for the ends of the balloons. Slide the marshmallow on first, and then dip the stick in melted chocolate and then add the cake ball on the end of the stick, just like you would a normal cake pop. Check out my Cake Pop Basics page for more tips on how to make cake pops. 

marshmallows for the ends of the balloons

The balloon cake pops were dipped into six different colours of white chocolate, dyed with powdered food colouring and candy oil. The marshmallows didn't really add the effect that I wanted them to. Perhaps I will use mini marshmallows instead of micro marshmallows next time! Another lesson learned on these cake pops is that they're not hot-weather friendly. Some of them started sliding down the sticks because the party venue was not air-conditioned, which means it was hot and humid, thanks to our "lovely" tropical weather. Perhaps going with "upside-down" cake pops would've been better? But then they wouldn't look like balloons...

balloon cake pops

The carousel horse sugar cookies were decorated using a mix of fondant and royal icing. I used a rocking horse cookie cutter and just trimmed the end off to get the horse. I used a lighter yellow for the background and green, orange, blue and purple for the horses, to match the colours on the invitation card. 

carousel horse cookie army

The details, like the white dotted border, the seat & shoes on the horses and the red & white striped poles, were piped on using royal icing. I added gold dragees to the ends of the poles for a little bit of fancy. 

love the fancy striped poles

The carousel horse cookies and balloon cake pops went on this lovely Amusement Park-themed dessert table, styled by the Hokey Pokey team. The bright colours and the striped red and white table cloth makes me hear circus music just by looking at it! What a fun and colourful set-up! Happy 1st Birthday, Ezekiel!

Amusement Park Dessert Table*

Carousel Horse cookies*

Happy 1st Birthday, Ezekiel!*

* photos courtesy of Hokey Pokey