Q. Hey, I'm e-mailing the expert with a freezing question! I'm making cake balls for my sister's wedding reception next week. I'm not sure if you've heard of or made the cake balls yet. They are kind of a big thing around here. It's just a crumbled up cake mixed with frosting and then formed into balls. Then the balls are dipped in melted chocolate and voila, cake balls! One of my friends has made them and frozen them before dipping them into the chocolate and frozen them after dipping them. She says both times as they are thawing they get little condensation droplets and look weird, but still taste fine.
I wondered if you have any tips for how I could freeze these things without them getting the condensation droplets on them. I was hoping to make up all the cake balls and then freeze them this week, and then dip them next week just before the wedding. Any tips would be great if you get a chance. I'm not really sure how I got roped into making these things. If freezing them isn't going to be a good option then I can just make them all next week, I just thought I would see what my options were and if you had any good ideas!
A: Hi Gwen, the problem I see with freezing these is the frosting inside the cake balls. Frosting does not freeze well because it will separate and hold in a lot of moisture. That's why little droplets form on them after they are frozen. My advice is to bake all the cakes up to 2 months ahead of time, crumble them when cooled and freeze in zip top bags. Squeeze all the air out of the bags and stack the zip top bags like bricks in your freezer to make room for all of them.
A few nights before the reception, pull out the frozen crumbled cake bags and let them defrost on your counter with the bags open. This will let some of the moisture escape. Mix in the frosting, and form the balls. Refrigerate them for a day or two so they won't crumble when you dip them, and then dip in melted chocolate when it's reception time. These look so yummy, I can't wait to try them myself!
Another tip for melting your chocolate, I learned that you can put bakers chocolate buttons in a oven safe bowl and set in your oven on the lowest setting (150 degrees) for as long as you want. It will melt and if it hardens up a bit while you are dipping, just stick it back in the oven until chocolate melts. This way you don't have to worry about burning the chocolate in the microwave or using a double boiler. This won't work with regular chocolate chips, just bakers chocolate. Chocolate chips have too much wax in them so they tend to burn.
Response:
Hey Jenny, thanks for your freezing tips. I did a trial run yesterday and made them up today and I think it's going to work PERFECT. So I've been baking cakes all day and I just put the last of 16 cake mixes in the oven and I'm so glad that part is out of the way!
By the way, I figured out a way to make chocolate mint cake balls. I picked up some Andes mint chocolate chips and dipped the chocolate (devils food cake and chocolate frosting) cake balls in the melted andes mints...HEAVEN!!!! I think they are my new favorite cake balls. Thanks for the idea!
-Gwen
