This Root Beer Float Poke Cake is the delicious creamy taste of a root beer float in cake form!
Poke cakes are a really fun and easy dessert idea. You simply bake up a cake in a 9 by 13 inch pan, and then poke some holes in it. Fill those holes with something like fudge sauce, caramel, or sweetened condensed milk and enjoy!
One of my favorite parts about them is that they can be made into all sorts of different flavors. This Root Beer Float Poke Cake is just one of so many variations that are amazing.
How to Make Root Beer Float Poke Cake
This is a brief overview of this simple recipe. For the full recipe with all of the measurements, see the recipe card at the bottom of the post.
- Mix up the cake batter. I use cake mix for this recipe and it works perfectly.
- Add in the root beer concentrate. Read more about this below.
- Bake the cake. After baking, poke holes in the cake, and fill them with sweetened condensed milk.
- Serve and enjoy. I love serving this with ice cream on top instead of frosting, but both would be great.
Root Beer Concentrate
This fun little ingredient is essential for the this recipe. When I was first developing this recipe I thought that I could just replace the water that the cake mix calls for with root beer. While that tasted good and did work, you could still primarily taste the cake and not the root beer.
Then I switched and used the root beer concentrate. It worked perfectly, and when combined with the sweetened condensed milk you really got that delicious and frothy root beer float flavor.
You can find near the extracts in the grocery store or you can buy it on Amazon.
Frosting
Most poke cakes use a whipped topping or stabilized whipped cream for a topping. Because this is flavored like a root beer float, vanilla ice cream seemed like the most appropriate topping. That being said, you should do what sounds best to you!
Storing
Store your poke cake in the refrigerator for up to four days. I like to store mine in the pan that I baked it in and covered with aluminum foil. As with all recipes, use your best discretion when it comes to leftovers.
More Delicious Poke Cakes
If you try this poke cake recipe or any of my other recipes, leave a comment and let me know what you think!
Root Beer Float Poke Cake
Ingredients
- 13.25 ounces vanilla cake mix plus the ingredients the mix calls for
- 1 1/2 teaspoon Root Beer concentrate
- 14 ounces of sweetened condensed milk
- vanilla ice cream
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to what is suggested on the box (for me that was 350).
- Mix your cake mix according to the instructions, adding in 1 1/2 teaspoon root beer concentrate.
- Bake the cake according to the instructions (for me that was 28 minutes). Let the cake rest for about 10 minutes after you take it out of the oven. Then poke holes throughout the cake using the bottom of a wooden spoon.
- Pour the sweetened condensed milk over the cake, filling all of the holes as evenly as possible.
- Cover and refrigerate the cake overnight. Serve with vanilla ice cream.
Happy Valley Chow says
First off root beer floats in general are the bees knees. Your poke cake looks amazing, love the creativity :)
Happy Blogging!
Happy Valley Chow
Thank you so much!
Trish - Mom On Timeout says
This is so freakin’ creative Lisa! Love it! Pinned :)
Thanks Trish!!
Julianne @ Beyond Frosting says
What a fantastic idea for a poke cake!! I adore poke cakes! It’s like I was sheltered from desserts growing up because the first time I had one was last year!
I only started making poke cake after blogging too!! It’s not my absolute favorite dessert, but I LOVE all the different things you can do with it!
Lindsay @ Life, Love and Sugar says
I have been eyeing that root beer extract too! I LOVE root beer, I bet this cake is to die for!
Tonia says
Yum! Makes me think of summer!
Cathy@LemonTreeDwelling says
OH my goodness I LOVE all the ways you made this more root beer floaty…..it sounds like a poke cake even I could get behind!!
Ashley says
Do you still replace the water in cake mix with root beer plus add in concentrate?
Nope, just the concentrate Ashley :)
Tammy says
What is root beer concentrate? Is it the same as root beer extract or something different like a Torrani syrup-type flavoring?
Hi Tammy! Root Beer Concentrate is found in the spice aisle by the vanilla extract. I use the McCormick brand :)
Tally says
Sounds fabulous!!