Root Beer Floats

You know what? You know what day it is? And you know what I have photos of?




CUPCAKE SATURDAY!

Last weekend I had an entirely too delicious and cupcake filled time. I started baking on Friday, and didn't stop until well into Saturday, which meant not only was our kitchen ridiculously appealing, but my legs were exhausted.

What made it easier, however, is that my mom got a new iPad. She got it a few months ago, but I've been really taking advantage of it lately. I love that I can easily grab it and prop it up so I can see my recipes without having to lug down an approximately 20,000 pound laptop down and up the stairs. Plus, it's easier to shield from flying powdered sugar. Because when I bake, I bake hard (wait, what?). Monkey also got an iPad, so I've been abusing his as well. I'm waiting to see how long before one of them caves and tells me to get my own.



I've already let this photo of the finished cupcakes slip loose, but I'm only going to approach one half of the bottom tier.

Those were Root Beer Float cupcakes and man oh man that frosting was *awesome*. The cake? Not so much. I'm going to admit something that might alienate me from, well, everyone, but I don't actually like chocolate. I mean, it's okay. But I'd prefer chocolate chip cookies without the chocolate chips, I'd pick vanilla cake and ice cream over chocolate any day, and when I'm angry and PMSing, you'll have better luck with cheering me up with mashed potatoes. Brownie edges are the one exception to my ambivalence to chocolate. I can, and have been known to, cut the entire edges off a pan of brownies to hoard for myself. When friends of my parents bought us the brownie pan that makes individual brownies, I was excited. Way too excited. (Have we used it yet? No. But we did buy one for Monkey's sister's wedding. What can I say, I've been busy baking other things!)

The cake was not very moist, the filling helped, but you could still tell the cupcake was definitely lacking.Plus, even with all of the root beer-y goodness in the batter, you couldn't taste a darn thing in the actual cake! I'm thinking about doing an adaption of AmyBITES' butterbeer cupcakes for the actual cupcake because they turned out so fabulously. I'm also trying to figure out how I can make a root beer syrup/ganache because I think it would turn out better as a filling than frosting.

What I will say about the frosting is that after I filled the cupcakes, I had about half of the root beer flavor left over. Rather than let it go to waste, I dumped it back in the plain frosting and mixed it up. I think the cupcakes turned out much better that way, as it really accentuated the flavor.



I'm going to make these for Monkey's birthday, I think, with some adaptions. Root beer is is soda of choice (Dr Pepper and Squirt are mine!), so I think he'd get a real kick out of these. He only got to try one because he was out of town when I made them, so I predict he'll quickly forget about them when it comes time to make them again. I may just use a plain vanilla/chocolate cake mix for the actual cupcake part, mostly because I'm lazy, but also because I know they'll turn out well that way. I think I'd also make them again if I were to have a girls night. Root beer floats always remind me of slumber parties, so I think they'd be an awesome addition to a late night of movies with the girls.

Either way, that frosting is coming back with a vengeance.