Christmas pud cake pops recipe

Give your Christmas table a bit of extra flair with these cute home-made Christmas pud cake pops. Not only do they look good, they taste pretty good too!

Ingredients

• 100g (3½oz) dark chocolate
• 125g (4oz) fruit cake
• 125g (4oz) Madeira or plain cake
• 2 level tbsp desiccated coconut

To decorate

:

• 100g (3½oz) dark chocolate
• 60g (2oz) white-chocolate cake covering
• Tubes of red and green coloured writing icing
• Baking sheet, lined with Bakewell paper

You will also need:

• Lolly sticks 10-15cm (4-6in) long
• Paper piping bag
• 12 petit fours cases, optional
• Fine ribbon and labels

Method

1. Put the chocolate in a large bowl over a pan of simmering water and leave it to melt. Stir it, then rub the fruit cake and plain cake between your fingers, to make crumbs, straight into the chocolate. Add the coconut and mix well. Leave to cool for 10 mins, then divide the mixture into 12 golf-ball sized portions (about 1 tbsp of mixture per portion). Form these into balls and push a lolly stick into each one. Lay them on the lined baking sheet and chill until firm — 1 hour or overnight is fine.
2. To decorate: Melt the dark chocolate in a bowl over simmering water. Half-fill a large jug or bowl with sugar ready to stand the cake pops in. Dip the balls in the chocolate, letting the excess drip off, and stand them in the sugar and leave until the chocolate is set.
3. Melt the white-chocolate cake covering and pipe it on top to represent cream on the pud. Leave to set, then use the writing icing to pipe holly leaves and berries on top. Leave to set. Put a cake case on the stick underneath the cake. Add ribbon and write names on tags to use the cake pops as edible place settings. These cake pops will keep for a few days in a cool place.