Every once in a while, you come across the easiest wow-factor cake and you wonder why you’ve never tried to make it before! That’s how I felt about the chocolate candy box cake that I’d been seeing on Instagram for a while now.

I’ve heard this cake called: ‘chocolate candy box cake’, ‘candy box cake’, or ‘Kit Kat cake’ – the latter because of the border around it. It’s basically a chocolate cake that has a bunch of candy on top. It has a border made of Kit Kat or other chocolate finger treats or pirouline wafers. You can make it in the shape of a circle or a rectangle and you can put only chocolate on it or a mix of candy and chocolate. Once you’re done, wrap a ribbon around the cake, and, voila, you have a beautiful cake!

I did some online searches and watched a few YouTube videos for tips on how to make the cake. There’s lots of inspiration out there.

Here are the 5 easy steps I took for making my daughter a chocolate candy box cake for her 18th birthday. You can also read my last post on throwing a surprise 18th birthday party, where we served this cake.

Step 1: Shop for the cake ingredients as well as the candy on top
For this cake, you’ll need:

• one box of Betty Crocker chocolate cake mix
• two tubs of Betty Crocker store-bought icing
• 200 grams or 8 ounces of 6 different types of candy
• 14 full size Kit Kat bars
• ribbon

The icing acts as the glue for the border and the candy on top, so it’s important to have enough. Find out what the recipient’s favorite candy is and buy an assortment of candy that will give interesting texture and color to the cake. I recommend using colored chocolate candies like  Smarties and M&Ms, but you can also use both Skittles and M&Ms, if you want to offer a non-chocolate candy option. I’ve seen cakes made with mini-cookies, but I didn’t do that because I thought they might get a bit soggy. You can also use a mix of milk, dark, and white chocolates and alternate them between compartments on the top of the cake. The possibilities are endless!

Step 2: Make the cake
I made the cake earlier in the day and let it cool completely. I used two 9-inch rounds. Once I was ready to assemble the chocolate candy cake box, I got everything out and got to work. To ice the cake, make sure you have a generous layer of icing on the sides because that’s where you’re attaching the Kit Kat border. Break the Kit Kat bars in their bags for a clean break and for less mess. Attach the Kit Kat wafers, writing side towards the inside. Try to keep the wafer fingers in the order you broke them in, because this gives you a neater border.

Step 3: Make the separations for the candy on top of the cake
Using six single Kit Kat wafers, partition off six sections on top of the cake. In the center, place a large gumdrop or any other large candy like a Ferrero Rocher ball. You can also pile up a bunch of colored candy in the center.

Step 4: Start filling in each section with candy
Think about what you want your chocolate candy box cake top to look like by arranging the candy in terms of color, texture, size, and height. For this cake, I put the Smarties and M&Ms on opposite sides and I also put the Junior Mints and Malteser candies on opposite sides, to balance out color and shape, respectively. I placed the Mars bites and the Twix bites opposite each other because they matched in terms of size and shape and height. For the Mars and Twix, I used icing to glue pieces together to make a high pile. I did the same for the Maltesers. You don’t want the candy to roll off the cake.

Step 5: Add a ribbon
For my daughter’s cake, I added a pink and a blue ribbon because it matched the color of the decorations we had. You can use fabric ribbon or paper ribbon and curl the ends.

Enjoy! This chocolate candy box cake was so much fun to make and serve. The guests loved the cake and took lots of photos. I must say, it’s a bit hard to cut the cake with all of the candy on top, but most guests were happy with an extra serving of candy!

Have you ever made a chocolate candy box cake? What variations have you seen or tried?

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