Soda Cupcakes

As I mentioned in my previous post, my recent afternoon tea did not consist just of Strawberry-Cream Cheese cupcakes (as good as they were).

There were also Soda Cupcakes.

Again, these are out of Betty Crocker's Big Book of Cupcakes. You can find the recipe for Orange Soda Cupcakes here, as part of a book preview on Google Books. I made half using orange soft drink and the other half using Vanilla Coke. Both tasted fine, but the orange worked better. The coke flavour was not very pronounced.

I think I'll keep trying other flavours. Lemonade might be good. Raspberry drink? Or Ribena even? I have already disgusted a few people by suggesting that I might try making Sarsaparilla cupcakes so I won't be offended if you think any of my other flavour ideas are awful. (Sars is not just for old people!)

Instead of just dusting with icing sugar I decided to up the fizz factor and use sherbet. This seems to work best if you mix it in with a little icing sugar, both to reduce the acidity (I was concerned someone would inhale deeply and choke on sherbet... but I'm probably just paranoid) and also because the sherbet seems to melt away and get oddly frothy if it warms up in the heat of the day.

There you have it. Fizz in a cake.