Best Ever Popcorn Balls

  4.5 – 411 reviews  • Popcorn Ball Recipes

Green smoothie that is delicious and guaranteed to please. Before leaving the house, grab your daily allotment of fruits and vegetables.

Prep Time: 10 mins
Cook Time: 10 mins
Total Time: 20 mins
Servings: 20

Ingredients

  1. 5 quarts plain popped popcorn
  2. ¾ cup light corn syrup
  3. ¼ cup butter or margarine
  4. 2 teaspoons cold water
  5. 2 ⅝ cups confectioners’ sugar
  6. 1 cup marshmallows
  7. cooking spray

Instructions

  1. Place popped popcorn into a large bowl.
  2. Combine corn syrup, butter, water, confectioners’ sugar, and marshmallows in a saucepan over medium heat. Heat and stir until the marshmallows have melted and the mixture comes to a boil.
  3. Carefully pour hot marshmallow mixture over popcorn and toss together to coat each kernel evenly.
  4. Grease hands with cooking spray and quickly shape coated popcorn into balls before it cools too much to shape.
  5. Wrap balls with cellophane or plastic wrap and store at room temperature.

Nutrition Facts

Calories 165 kcal
Carbohydrate 31 g
Cholesterol 0 mg
Dietary Fiber 1 g
Protein 1 g
Saturated Fat 1 g
Sodium 71 mg
Sugars 25 g
Fat 5 g
Unsaturated Fat 0 g

Reviews

Brittany Mitchell
Easy, straightforward recipe and delicious! after dinner treat with left over movie popcorn
Jason Williams
I chose this recipe because I needed a treat for a classroom that was gluten free and dairy free. I used a dairy free butter in place of margarine . (I don’t know the difference, so I mention it). For the recipe, I learned that five quarts of popcorn is exactly two batches of popped kernels if you follow the directions on the kernel bag. When you take the mixture off the heat, it is very hot! And stays hot for a bit before cooling rather quickly. The popcorn balls formed easier once the mixture cooled a bit. If you form the balls with bare hands, grease often, as it gets sticky and web-like when the cooking spray wears off. This recipe made 20 baseball sized popcorn balls. They seem like rice Krispy treats but with popcorn Instead of puffed rice. I think the kids will love them!
Laura Watson
Muy sabroso y una buena idea por hacer como comida de dedos. Gracias!
Brian Barker
It’s a good recipe , tasty morsels of deliciousness ! It can be yours to add your favorite , add ins . Watched my Dad make homemade popcorn and adding the syrup and powdered sugar and vanilla flavoring in the 1950’s , very comparable recipes. Making Caramel corn is just as easy . Gave it a 5 star
Veronica Sanchez
I used this recipe as a base..I cut powdered sugar to just 2 cups added 1 1/2 tbsp cider vinegar, used 3 bags of butter flavor popcorn, added red and yellow food coloring to the sugar mixture and then mixed all together with poured in a bag of candy corn..
John Krueger
Super easy and delicious. Added some food color for fun! Definitely making again.
Melanie Baird
These are definitely easy to make, held together nicely, and very eay to work with. I used latex gloves and buttered them to prevent stick and mess. No candy thermometer required, they are soft and chewy but had to deduct one star for lacking in flavor. I did add a half tsp vanilla but could have added more. It lacked a little ‘something’. I did make them for the holidays so added some holiday colored peanut M&M’s. looked very pretty and festive.
Christopher Thompson
Yummy and easy! I buttered a roasting pan and put it in the oven at 200 degrees. As I popped the popcorn I put it in the pan. Keeping everything warm made mixing the balls easier.
Danielle Yang
I didn’t make any changes to this recipe. They turned out fantastic. People could not just eat one they ate 4 and 5. I did make them a bit smaller as there were small children at the halloween party. Definitely will make these again!
April Baker
These were so quick and easy. I made them for a food tech assessment and they took no time at all, and I was able to easily customise them for the assessment. I would definitely recommend making these, and would 100% make them again!
Jill Herman
I used real butter instead of margarine and added two teaspoons of vanilla. It was delicious
Jorge Edwards
Great simple recipe. Later realized it might be nice to add some vanilla or other fun flavor. Would definitely make again. Good chewy popcorn ball.
Brett Miller
I also added vanilla. They turned out great! I accidentally found a great way to keep them from sticking to your hands while forming them. Liberally coat your hands with butter then run them under cold water but do not dry them, just shake off excess water and form your popcorn into balls. As soon as it feels like they are starting to stick, just run them under cold water again and repeat.
Jessica Garcia
Super easy and yummy!! My Grandkids liked helping making them into little balls and gobbling them up
Juan Grant
I scooped the ball size out on parchment paper and successfully formed them as they began to cool.
Lindsay Rivera
These came out great! I scaled it down to 6 cups of popcorn as a ‘trial run’, and I was happy with the results. I also used butter and added a little salt and a 1/2 tsp of vanilla to the corn syrup mixture. I’ll try it with some maple extract another time. I also added a handful of mini candy corn to the popcorn, adding a few more to the outside of the balls. They came out soft and chewy, but I’m wondering how long they’ll stay that way. Thanks for the recipe!
Heather Graham
Added 2 teaspoons of vanilla as recommended and they were gone quickly.
Alyssa Horton
I have made both old fashion & this recipe that you uses marshmallows. Both very delicious. This recipe with marshmallow doesn’t call for a candy thermometer. Easy recipe to make.
Courtney Ellis
As others suggested I added 1/4 tsp salt and 3/4 tsp vanilla extract at end of melting marshmallows. Yielded 14 balls sized slightly bigger than a baseball. Like that these are soft and slightly chewy.
Elizabeth Rodgers
OK. Not bad, but not really what I think of when I think of popcorn balls. This turned out closer to rice krispie treats. In fact, on the last batch I ran out of popped corn, so I made a separate small batch of rice krispie treats.
Jennifer Smith
Easy to make and are sweet and delightful.

 

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