Animal Cake Pops

These animal cake pops go with the Jungle Buddies cupcakes for baby Kayla's first month party. I made six different animals, with two being of a simpler design, as requested by the baby's daddy.

Animal Cake Pops

To make the "cake" part of the cake pop, I crumbled red velvet cake and swirled it with a little vanilla buttercream, and then shaped the cake balls. Everything starts with the basic round shape. For the giraffes, I made it into a more oval shape, with a round knob at the end for the muzzle. For the polar bears, I shaped it so that the part for their mouth and nose stuck out a little bit. 

chocolate ears

For the ears on the animals, I used white chocolate wafers. I cut the ends off using a small circle cutter, so that they would better stick to the rounded shape of the cake pop. I attached them on using a little melted chocolate, and then let that harden fully before dipping the entire thing into melted chocolate. For more cake pop tips, please check out my cake pop basics page. 

Polar bear cake pops

I have given up in using Wilton candy melts to dip the cake pops in. The candy melts are just way too thick and I end up having to add so much melted shortening to thin out the consistency that the overall taste and texture get affected. So, I've switched over to only dipping my cake pops in compound white chocolate. Compound chocolate is great because it doesn't have to be tempered. And it dries hard, with a smooth shiny finish, and has a crisp, satisfying "snap" when you bite into the cake pop.  

panda cake pops

To colour the chocolate, I used wilton candy oil. Only use oil-based or powdered food colouring to colour chocolate, as water-based gels or dyes will cause the chocolate to seize and thicken, becoming unusable. 

my fave, giraffe cake pops!

The giraffes were double dipped in chocolate, first in white chocolate dyed yellow, and then again in dark chocolate for their muzzles. I dotted on two dots of yellow chocolate for their nostrils, and drew on their dark chocolate spots using a toothpick. Their eyes and the ossicones (yes, that's their brown "antlers") are made of fondant, attached with a little melted chocolate.

friendly tiger cake pops

The inspiration for these Tiger cake pops came from a children's toy box that I saw in a store while window shopping at the mall! I drew on their stripes with dark chocolate dyed black (actually leftovers from Club-100 bakes). The rest of the details are made out of fondant. I used a black edible ink marker for their mouths and the dots on their cheeks. The food marker draws SO much better on white chocolate than it did on these cake pops covered with candy melts!

close-up of the cute tiger cake pop!

For the simpler cake pops, I used an elephant and pig cookie cutter to cut shapes out of fondant, and then stuck those on to the plain round cake pop. The elephant cake pops are made in the same way as these cake pops.  

elephant cake pops

pig cake pops

I had to make 2 sytrofoam stands to display these animal cake pops on. I'm not a very craftsy person and making the stands took me almost an hour! Geez. You'd think wrapping styrofoam in coloured paper and poking evenly spaced holes in it would be an easy thing, right?

cake pop stand

Baby Kayla's daddy requested for one cake pop stand to be covered in pink paper, and the other one to be wrapped in blue. He always has to think of baby Kayla's older brother, see, to make sure that he's not left out at the party! 

love the shiny chocolate finish

view from the top

The cake pops were individually wrapped in cellophane as they were going to be used as the giveaways for the party. These little animals on a stick are too cute to eat! They go very nicely with the the Jungle Buddies cupcakes for baby Kayla's 1st month celebration. Happy 1st month, baby Kayla! 

cellophane-wrapped cake pops

party giveaways

Happy 1st Month, baby Kayla!