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    Home » Dessert Recipes » Chocolates

    Jungle Animal Pretzel Pops

    Modified: Oct 24, '23 · Published: Apr 12, '13 · By: Beth Klosterboer · Commission earned on paid or sponsored links.

    Embrace your wild side and make these Jungle Animal Pretzel Pops! These treats are so much fun to make with your kids and create their favorite animal!

    jungle animal pretzels including a tiger, hippo, giraffe, elephant, lion, zebra, and monkey.

    I've gone wild decorating these Chocolate Pretzel Jungle Animals. I'll admit that most of my edible craft projects are incredibly fun for me to create, but turning ordinary chocolate-dipped pretzel rods into animals has made me downright giddy.

    zebra and elephant pretzel pops.

    Earlier this week, I decorated some Farm Animal Pretzels using modeling chocolate, and they were cute, really cute, actually. My Farm Animal Pretzels were inspired by Crafts by Amanda's adorably decorated craft sticks. The designs were pretty simple.

    With my jungle animals, I decided to kick it up a notch and add a bit more detail. I went a little nuts with the elephant, but all that detail was worth it. He is my absolute favorite design, so far, anyway!

    tiger, giraffe, and lion pretzel pops.

    I had just finished making the lion and tiger when my exchange student came home from school.

    She was excited to try her hand at designing a pretzel animal and she created the giraffe. It's fantastic, isn't it?

    hippo, zebra, and elephant pretzels.

    Each animal took me between ten to twenty minutes to design and as simple as the hippo looks, it took the most effort. At first, I just couldn't get the nose to look right. I think I finally got it. You can tell just how much I love the elephant based on the number of pictures I took of it.

    My exchange student and I have already made several more to share with you, most of which are much simpler than this herd of jungle animals.

    Jungle Animal Pretzel Pops

    Before you begin, you can use candies like Tootsie Rolls, salt water taffy, Laffy Taffy, Airheads, or Starburst Fruit Chews to create the decorations, but with these designs, I highly recommend using modeling chocolate (recipe here.). You can make one batch of white modeling chocolate and add coloring to each design.

    Tip

    To keep the chocolate from cracking on your pretzels. Chocolate shrinks as it cools and when it shrinks onto something hard, it usually cracks. If you take the pretzels out of the bag and allow them to sit at room temperature for several hours or overnight they will soften just enough to keep this from happening, but not enough to become stale.

    Ingredients

    • melted and tempered white and milk chocolate OR melted white or light cocoa confectionery coating/candy melts
    • pretzel rods
    • candy eyes or black edible pearls
    • homemade modeling chocolate (or candies like Tootsie Rolls, Laffy Taffy, Airheads, Starbust, etc.)
    • candy coloring
    • black and brown food coloring markers

    Supplies

    • baking pans lined with parchment paper
    • tweezers (used for food only)
    • kitchen shears or knife
    • optional: rolling pin, small metal cutters

    Instructions

    dipping pretzel rods in melted white chocolate.

    Either dip your pretzels into the melted and tempered pure chocolate or melted confectionery coating/candy melts or spoon it over the surface of the pretzel, leaving the tip you are holding, uncovered.

    Shake off excess chocolate before setting the dipped pretzels on your parchment paper-lined baking pans. If using pure chocolate, one coat will probably be sufficient to cover the pretzel rods. If using confectionery coating/candy melts, you might want to put on two coats.

    Refrigerate if using pure chocolate, and freeze if using candy coating just until set. If freezing, it will only take about 3-4 minutes. Don't leave them in too long or the candy coating will crack.

    melting colored candy melts in jars and bowls set in a water batch in an electric skillet.

    If you are making an entire zoo full of different animals and are using confectionery coating/candy melts, you might want to consider using an electric skillet to keep small bowls of colored candy coating melted. For detailed instructions, see my Chocolate Making Tips page.

    Decorate your pretzels using modeling chocolate or assorted candy.

    You can either pinch off pieces of the modeling chocolate or candy and shape them into ears, spots, manes, noses, trunks, etc., or roll the modeling chocolate or candy out using a rolling pin and then cut using small metal cutters or kitchen shears.

    I did a combination of the techniques. Then use melted chocolate as "glue" to attach the candy to the chocolate-dipped pretzels. You can use corn syrup to attach pieces of modeling chocolate to other pieces of modeling chocolate, like when adding the nose to the lion's face.

    decorating elephant pretzels with modeling chocolate and black sugar pearls, zebra pretzels with modeling chocolate and candy eyes, and lion pretzels with modeling chocolate and candy eyes.

    Elephant

    dip the pretzel rod in grey candy melts

    2 black edible pearls - eyes

     ears and trunk from grey modeling chocolate
    tusk from white modeling chocolate

    Zebra

    dip a pretzel in white

    2 candy eyes

    snout and ears from white modeling chocolate or salt water taffy or Airheads
    mane from black modeling chocolate or Tootsie Rolls or black salt water taffy

    draw on the nose using a black food coloring marker

    Lion

    dip pretzel in yellow/orange

    2 candy eyes

    face and ears from yellow modeling chocolate, Lemon Tootsie Rolls or yellow taffy

    mane from orange modeling chocolate, or Orange Air Heads, Starburst, or orange taffy
    nose from brown modeling chocolate or chocolate salt water taffy

    decorating a pretzel monkey using dark and light brown modeling chocolate and candy eyes and decorating a giraffe pretzel with yellow-orange and brown modeling chocolate and candy eyes.
    Monkey

    dip pretzel rod in milk chocolate

    2 candy eyes

    face and ears from brown modeling chocolate or chocolate taffy
    nose and fur in ears from tan-colored modeling chocolate or caramels
    use a black food coloring marker to draw on the nose and smile

     Giraffe

    dip pretzel rod in yellow/orange

    2 candy eyes

     ears and face from yellow modeling chocolate or Lemon Tootsie Rolls or yellow taffy
    snout, antlers, and spots from brown modeling chocolate or Tootsie Rolls or chocolate taffy
    draw spots on the face using a brown food coloring marker

    decorating a pretzel tiger using white, orange, and brown modeling chocolate with black food coloring stripes, and a hippo pretzel using light and dark grey modeling chocolate and black sugar pearls.

    Tiger

    dip pretzel rod in orange

    2 candy eyes

     ears and face from orange modeling chocolate or Orange Airheads, Starburst, or orange taffy
    snout from white modeling chocolate or Vanilla Tootsie Rolls or Airheads
    nose from black modeling chocolate, chocolate Tootsie Roll, or chocolate Taffy
    draw stripes on the face and pretzel using a black food coloring marker

    Hippo

    2 black edible pearls - eyes
    head and ears from grey modeling chocolate
    nose from light grey modeling chocolate
    teeth from white modeling chocolate or Vanilla Tootsie Rolls
    make indentations for the nose using the back end of a skewer, and use the point to make the spots

    Embrace your wild side and make these Jungle Animal Pretzel Pops! These treats are so much fun to make with your kids and create their favorite animal!

    Related Recipes

    If you liked this Kid's Recipe, then you need to check out these other fascinating recipes that your little ones will love!

    Find over 100 cute and tasty kid's treats that are as much fun to make as they are to eat. Choose from cookies, cupcakes, popsicles, pretzels, and more.

    • Author
    • Recent Posts
    Beth Klosterboer
    Beth Klosterboer
    Hi, I'm Beth Klosterboer, a professional chocolatier & baker, cookbook author, and event planner. I love sharing recipes for happy occasions here on Hungry Happenings. I also create easy fudge recipes to share at HowToMakeEasyFudge.com, rice krispie treat recipes at HowToMakeCerealTreats.com, and easy cookie recipes at HowToMakeEasyCookies.com
    Beth Klosterboer
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      Recipe Rating




    1. Anonymous says

      August 02, 2014 at 12:45 am

      Thank you 🙂

      Reply
    2. Anonymous says

      August 01, 2014 at 5:13 pm

      How do you store these and how long will they stay good for?

      Reply
      • beth says

        August 01, 2014 at 5:54 pm

        I store them in an airtight container. A metal tin works best but Rubbermaid or Tupperware will work fine too. They will be best if eaten within a few weeks, but will stay fresh for a month or even longer if you use really fresh pretzels. Find pretzels with the longest shelf life.

        Reply
    3. Michelle | Creative Food says

      May 10, 2013 at 3:02 am

      These are seriously so amazing!! and so cute! 🙂

      Reply
    4. Kayla's Creations says

      April 27, 2013 at 5:10 pm

      I can't get over 1 - how cute these are & 2 how talented you are! Thank you so much for sharing at the circle of faith link party, I'm stopping over to let you know that I will be featuring you today, linky opens at 6 pm > http://www.kaylascreationsblog.com/ Hope your having a great day!,

      -Kayla 🙂

      Reply
      • Beth Jackson Klosterboer says

        April 27, 2013 at 6:45 pm

        Thanks so much for the feature. I'm so glad you like these so much:)

        Reply
    5. Pint Sized Baker says

      April 22, 2013 at 1:39 am

      So stinkin' cute! Love them!! You're so clever! Pinned this! Thanks for sharing these on Two Cup Tuesday at Pint Sized Baker I hope to see ya again on Monday night!

      Reply
    6. Kayla's Creations says

      April 21, 2013 at 1:05 am

      These are so adorable, your so talented! I would love to have you come link up to My wonderful friend Heather & I's link party > http://www.kaylascreationsblog.com/2013/04/circle-of-faith-link-party-3.html Hope your having a great Saturday! :),

      -Kayla 🙂

      Reply
    7. Trish - Mom On Timeout says

      April 19, 2013 at 9:54 pm

      So, so clever Beth! Pinned!

      Reply
    8. Beth Gorden says

      April 19, 2013 at 9:58 am

      Oh WOW! These are amazingly cute & CLEVER!!! You seriously amaze me with your creativity and the finished product. I am adding to buffer to share on social media this week!

      Thanks for linking up to TGIF! It is always so much fun to see what you've come up with!! Hope to see you linked up again today =)

      Have a great weekend,
      Beth =)

      Reply
    « Older Comments
    Beth Jackson Klosterboer

    Welcome to Hungry Happenings!

    I'm Beth. I've been a professional chocolatier & baker for over 30 years, have written 5 cookbooks, and love creating fun food for holidays and special occasions.

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