I've been eating and loving Candice R’s Oreo cookie balls for years, as they generally show up at every church event and often when you eat at the R’s home. One holiday season, Emily and I even helped Candice make a batch so I knew this is a pretty easy to create treat. Even so, I had this feeling that there was probably some magic step Candice used to make her truffles turn out perfectly every single time. My suspicions were fueled by the contrast between what Candice creates versus another church member’s attempt that was...well, less than perfect. Way, less than perfect. Downright misshapen and awful looking less than perfect. You get the idea.
Even in a kitchen laden with the usual assortment of gingerbread boys and sugar cookies this December, I decided it might be fun to try a darling version of the truffles for the senior choir Christmas party. The picture online showed absolutely adorable white chocolate dipped snowmen, complete with jaunty mini-oreo hats. Best of all, the melting aspect of the snowmen meant no need to form perfect round ball shapes! In fact, messy globs on the bottom were encouraged to help create the illusion of a melting snowman. Can it get any better than using a recipe that actually asks you to strive for messy imperfection - something I happen to be very good at!
While the recipe itself is very simple, Candice gave me a tip that made all the difference in turning out uniform snowmen heads with a smooth white chocolate coating. I already knew it was very necessary to freeze the oreo/cream cheese balls before the dipping process. This is particularly important when coating a very dark cookie ball with the snow white chocolate, because who wants to have a snowman head littered with random black globs of snowman guts? Nothing cheerful about that image! Once my balls were properly frozen, Candice revealed the easiest method is to insert a toothpick into the ball before the dip. I love it when great cooks are willing to reveal their secrets and all the better when the techniques actually work!
I’ve always loved Candice’s totally yummy Oreo balls for their smooth chocolatey goodness, tasting surprisingly like a creamy truffle. Taking that recipe and lifting it up a level in downright cuteness turned out to be great fun and a real crowd pleaser among the seniors. In fact, I just might have created a third treat that will become an annual addition to my holiday baking list.
Melting Snowman Oreo Balls
from thegirlwhoateeverything.com
Ingredients:
1 pkg. (8 oz.) brick cream cheese, softened
36 OREO Cookies (regular size), finely crushed
16 oz. vanilla candy wafers or melts, melted (these can be found at Walmart, target, Michaels or other craft stores) (*Because of the notes below, I used Ghirardelli white chocolate melts.)
48 Mini OREO Bite Size Cookies
decorations: decorating icing or gel; multi-colored sprinkles
Directions:
Mix cream cheese and cookie crumbs until well blended. I like to crush the Oreos in a food processor and then add the cream cheese and process it together. It can also be done by hand though.
Shape into 48 (1-inch) balls; place in single layer in shallow pan. Freeze for at least 20 minutes. They can be frozen for longer. Dip balls in melted coating (see note); I do this by using a fork and tapping the fork on the bowl of my candy coating to remove some of the extra coating. Place in shallow waxed paper-lined pan, allowing excess coating to pool at bottom of each ball. Decorate with remaining ingredients as shown in photo. You can use the candy coating to adhere the hat to the head.
Refrigerate 1 hour or until firm. Keep refrigerated.
Notes
I have used almond bark before to dip these but found that the candy wafers work better. Sometimes when you dip the balls the Oreos can leave some crumbs in the coating but the wafers tend to do this way less.
I like to divide my coating into half or fourths so that if for some reason dark oreo bits get in one bowl you have others as back up. You can even dip them twice. Once in a layer and if it has oreo bits, oh well. The second time dip them in a fresh melting coating bowl and then there are no crumbs to worry about. I only had to dip these once but in the past I've had oreo bits sneak in my white coating.
