It was a mid-winter Monday holiday and friends were gathering for lunch and conversation; which meant, the kids would expect a buzzyfoods cake.
Hmmm…
I had come across a nice looking recipe for strawberry cream cheese frosting. That would more than likely work a treat with a lemon-lime soda cake.
Let’s give it a go!
INGREDIENTS
•8 oz cream cheese, softened
•1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
•1/4 tsp salt
•1/4 tsp black pepper
•1 tsp vanilla
•1 cup sliced strawberries, pureed
•6+ cups powdered sugar
Place the sliced strawberries in a beaker and turn into a pulp with your immersion blender. Or, just pulse in your blender until finely mashed.
Add the strawberries, salt, black pepper (trust me, it really works nicely in frosting), and vanilla to a large mixing bowl and stir to combine. Add the cream cheese and butter and beat until fluffy.
Add the confectioners’ sugar in one cup measurements and beat until the frosting is the consistency you want.
Frost your cooled cake and stash in the fridge to chill until serving.
Note: if your frosting is a touch on the soft side, don’t worry, it’ll firm up in the fridge.
A note about the cake: I made one of my go-to “soda cakes,” using a white cake mix and Mexican lemon-lime soda (Sprite or Seven Up). I prefer the Mexican sodas 
because they are made with real sugar and not corn sweeteners; but you can certainly use 12 ounces of regular US-made soda if you prefer. Diet soda, however, is not recommended. I do not know why, that was just the main disclaimer on the recipe the first time I stumbled across the magic that is Soda Cake.
To make the cake, simply add 12 ounces of non-diet soda to a cake mix, then mix together and bake according to the instructions on the back of the box.
You do not need to add anything else. No oil. No eggs. No nothing. Just the cake mix and 12 ounces of soda.
When done, your cake will come out of the oven looking very much as it would if you’d gone the traditional route with egg and oil and what-have-you.
I tend to make my soda cakes in a 13×9 inch pan, for ease of transport to wherever I am getting together with my friends and their kids; but I have also made soda cake in layers with very good results.
That’s it!
Strawberry Cream Frosting and Lemon-Lime Cake – with added sprinkles on top.
All in all, this was a big hit. Carter didn’t really say much, but he is at that young teen age where comments may not be coming; but his younger brother Marshall, who is one of my toughest critics, told me how very much he liked it, and made a suggestion for my next effort.
Apparently, I am making brownies…