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Soda cakes are the BEST retro cake recipe around when it comes to saving time. All you need is a box of cake mix and a can of soda pop—the combinations are limitless! This cake recipe uses a box of Devil’s Food Cake Mix and a can of root beer. Slather it with whipped cream, and you have an easy dessert that your kids can make. (And my kids did make this!)

It also tastes as delicious as a dessert recipe that took a lot longer to make!

a slice of chocolate soda cake on a white plate with a piece of red cherry on top

Cake Mix and Soda

If you don’t want to frost it, that’s literally all you need for this recipe. We used Cool Whip whipped cream all over our cake just to add that little something, so this is really just a three-ingredient cake! It’s also not a cake that you can be fussy about. The crumb is exceptionally tender and will fall apart, as you can see from my photos. It’s not the least bit dry; simply tender and moist.

This is not a cake that you want to make that is supremely iced and fancy, however it does look very pretty with whipping cream and cherries on the outside. It just won’t slice perfectly, so don’t expect that! Try my new strawberry cake if you want a cake that has pretty slices!

Ingredients Needed:

one box devil’s food cake
one can of root beer soda
whipping cream or light icing

chocolate soda cake on a turquoise cake stand with a plate of chocolate cake below it on a red striped kitchen towel

Different Soda Cake Variations

There are so many combinations you can make a soda cake with; it’s not even funny. Literally, just pick a box of cake mix and see what soda pop goes with it! Some pairings you can try are:

Strawberry Shortcake – Strawberry Cake Mix and Cream Soda
Creamsicle – Orange Soda and White Cake Mix
Grape – Grape soda with white cake mix – try my homemade grape soda cupcakes as well!
Ginger Cake– Ginger Spice cake and Ginger Ale
Lemon Cake– Lemon cake mix and lemon lime soda

Karlynn’s Recipe Notes

This cake has a very tender crumb, so a heavy icing will simply tear it apart. You could even just use a vanilla icing glaze if desired.
Real whipping cream will deflate really quickly on this cake, so make it and eat it right away. Cool Whip tends to last a little bit longer.
IF you want to use a heavier frosting, freeze the cake, then frost the layers while it’s frozen. Works like a charm!

Don’t forget to try my famous buttercream frosting on your next cake as well, there’s a reason it’s famous!

Have fun guys! This is the perfect easy summertime cake recipe to try with the kids, they will LOVE picking out the combinations. Have fun and enjoy playing around with cake mixes!

Happy Baking!

Love,

Karlynn