Yummy Valentine's to All...

Happy Valentine's Day!

I made these treats to bring in to the office of my new job, and to send to my kid's schools, and for my neighbors. They are Red-Velvet Cake Balls. You might remember my discovery of the recipe for Oreo Cookie Bites. I went crazy over those! I saw them in a magazine and made them several times in one month.

You will also see a chocolate covered strawberry in that box. Yes! That is what it is, I made those as well. My kids were going crazy! I told them they had to wait until Valentine's dinner to have theirs!

This recipe is basically the same - except instead of crushing Oreo Cookies, you bake a 9X13 pan of cake mix. You really can use any flavor. The recipe I found & adapted was on Bakerella.com. She calls for store-bought cream cheese frosting, but mine is a little different, closer to the Oreo Cookie Bite recipe.

Bake the box of cake mix. When it cools, crumble it into a bowl. Stir in one 8oz box of cream cheese. Add 3/4 of a cup of powdered sugar. Mix together.


~ Even though I'm not a baker, there are only a few reasons I ever buy store-bought frosting, so I rarely have any on hand. Because Bakerella.com had called for the frosting instead of just plain cream cheese, I worried that maybe it wouldn't be sweet enough. Thus my addition of the powdered sugar.~

NEXT...

Roll tablespoons of the mixture into balls. I laid mine on wax paper over a cookie sheet. Then place the cookie sheet into the fridge, to let the cake balls firm up.

Once they are firm, melt some chocolate bark, chocolate chips, or chocolate rounds and drop the balls into the melted chocolate one at a time. Using a spoon, place the balls back onto the cookie sheet and, once filled, place the sheet back into the fridge.

At this point you can decorate them with other types of chocolate (or, like me, you might burn the white chocolate in the microwave, creating a dry crumbly substance that looked and smelled NOTHING like white chocolate...)

I had tiny little muffin papers and I placed mine in those, and then placed them into some Valentine boxes that I got on sale long ago.

Of course, I didn't make these M&M's but I DID make the little table runner beneath them. I thought the fabric pattern was pretty funky.

I can't wait to show you what else we've been playing with around here! We've really been crafty. Have a great day!!

I hope you get the chance to be creative today!