These are no-bake Oreo balls: crushed Oreos bound with cream cheese and sweetened condensed milk, rolled, chilled and dipped in melted chocolate. Four ingredients, no oven, and the only thing the recipe really depends on is chilling them properly before they go anywhere near the chocolate.
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Recipe
OREO BALLS WITH CONDENSED MILK
Ingredients
Ingredients Of Oreo balls with a condensed milk
Method
- Crush the Oreos into fine crumbs using a food processor or by placing them in a resealable bag and crushing them with a rolling pin.
- In a large bowl, mix the Oreo crumbs, softened cream cheese, and sweetened condensed milk until well combined.
- Roll the mixture into 1-inch balls and place them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
- Chill the balls in the refrigerator for 30 minutes to 1 hour, or until firm.
- Melt the chocolate chips in a double boiler or microwave, stirring frequently until smooth.
- Dip the Oreo balls into the melted chocolate using a fork, and place them back onto the parchment paper-lined baking sheet.
- Chill the balls in the refrigerator until the chocolate coating is firm, about 10-15 minutes.
- Once the chocolate has hardened, the Oreo balls are ready to serve!
Step by step, in pictures
Five moves, from the rolling pin to the last drip of chocolate.
Crush the Oreos to fine crumbs.- Mix in the cream cheese and condensed milk, then roll into balls.
- Chill until firm.
- Melt the chocolate.
- Dip on a fork and let the excess drip off.
Why this version uses cream cheese as well
Most Oreo ball recipes you will find use either cream cheese or condensed milk. The classic three-ingredient version is Oreos, cream cheese and chocolate; the newer condensed-milk version drops the cream cheese and uses the milk as the binder instead. This recipe uses both, which makes it a four-ingredient recipe.
What that buys you is a softer, richer centre. Cream cheese brings a slight tang that cuts the sweetness — condensed milk on its own is very sweet, because that is most of what it is. What it costs you is that the mixture is wetter and softer, so the chilling in step 4 matters more here than it does in a version bound with cream cheese alone.
If you were hoping for the three-ingredient version, this is not it, and the swap is not a straight one — dropping the cream cheese changes how much liquid the crumbs have to absorb.
Getting them firm enough to dip
This is where it goes wrong. The mixture is soft when it is mixed, and a soft ball dropped into warm melted chocolate loses its shape or falls off the fork entirely. The recipe gives 30 minutes to an hour in the fridge and it means it — firm all the way through, not just cold on the outside.
If the mixture is too sticky to roll cleanly in the first place, chill the bowl for twenty minutes before you start rolling rather than adding anything to it. Wet hands, or a light coating of cocoa on your palms, also stop it clinging.
The freezer is the shortcut, but do not overdo it: a frozen-solid ball can crack its coating as it warms back up and the chocolate lifts away from the surface.
The easiest way to dip them
A fork, and let gravity do the work. Drop the chilled ball into the melted chocolate, lift it out on the tines, and hold it over the bowl until the dripping slows — that is what gives you a thin, even coat instead of a thick pooled base.
Tap the fork gently on the rim of the bowl to shake the last of it off, then slide the ball onto the parchment rather than dropping it. A two-fork approach helps: one to lift, one to nudge it off.
Keep the chocolate shallow but deep enough to submerge a ball — a narrow bowl works better than a wide one for exactly this. And take the balls out of the fridge a few at a time, because the ones left on the counter soften while you work.
Ways to serve them
On a platter is the default and needs no explanation. On a stick — push a lollipop stick into each ball before the final chill and stand them upright in a jar — turns them into something people can pick up and walk away with, which suits a party.
In a glass, layered with whipped cream or chocolate shavings, makes individual servings out of them. And crumbled over ice cream or on top of a cake, they work as a topping rather than a thing in themselves.
Storing and freezing them
Keep them in an airtight container in the fridge — they contain cream cheese, so the fridge is not optional and they should not sit out at room temperature for long.
They freeze well, and this is the one to do if you are making them ahead. Freeze them in a single layer first so they do not stick together, then pack them with parchment between the layers. Food held at -18 °C (0 °F) stays safe indefinitely under USDA guidance; the three-month figure usually quoted for this kind of thing is about quality, not safety. Thaw them in the fridge rather than on the counter, or the coating sweats.
More from the site
For other no-fuss sweet things there is salted caramel brownies, banoffee pie, or cheese ice cream.
Oreo balls FAQ
Can I use other cookies instead of Oreos? Yes. Nutter Butters or graham crackers both work and give a different flavour. Anything with a cream filling behaves most like an Oreo, because the filling is part of the binder.
Can I use fat-free cream cheese? Yes, but the result is less creamy and less rich. Lower-fat cream cheese also carries more water, so expect a softer mixture and give it longer in the fridge.
Can I use unsweetened condensed milk? No. Unsweetened evaporated milk will not give the sweetness or the binding this recipe relies on — the sugar in sweetened condensed milk is doing structural work, not just flavour.
Can I use white chocolate instead of milk or dark? Yes, and it is a sweeter, creamier result. White chocolate seizes more easily than dark, so melt it gently and stop before it is completely liquid — the residual heat finishes it.
Can I add other ingredients to the mixture? Yes — chopped nuts, dried fruit or mini chocolate chips all work. Add them at the mixing stage and hold back a little of the cream cheese and condensed milk, because the extras take up room the binder was going to fill.
Can I make them ahead? Yes, and they are arguably better for it — the mixture firms up and the flavour settles. Make them, coat them, and keep them in the fridge until you need them.
Can I coat them in something other than chocolate? Yes. Melted caramel or peanut butter both work, though neither sets as hard as chocolate, so they stay tacky and are better eaten from the fridge.
