Cubicle kitchen: 'If you like Pina Coladas' Cupcakes

This week, I baked a little overboard.  First, I made some savory cookies, which I'll blog about later this week.  And then, I started feeling like I needed to make something sweet.  I'm not sure if it was a sense of balance, or just my sweet tooth that really spurred me on, but it had to be done.  Thankfully, we usually have enough on hand for me to make those kind of decisions on a Saturday morning.  Especially when it comes to ice cream in the freezer.

I have to once again highly recommend melted ice cream as an add-in for boxed cake mix.  You get a really moist cake, and the opportunity to play around with some flavors.  And it's the combining of flavors that really attracts me to baking, while not wanting to risk messing around too much with the delicate science of baking and creating something that didn't rise/spread/whatever.  This is a great coming together of convenience and experimentation.

And every instance of this cake has gotten rave reviews.  Everyone screams for ice cream.  This time I thought I would give everyone a chance to escape to the tropics with a beachy bake.  Because in Texas, we all like Pina Coladas, and we could use a little more rain...

'If you like Pina Coladas' Cupcakes
made 24 cupcakes and about 30 mini cupcakes

For the cake:

Find the recipe for the cupcakes at Cookies & Cups.  To make sure you have the right amount of ice cream, melt it and measure out 2 cups rather than relying on the pint not having too much air whipped in.

I used:

• Pineapple cake mix
• 1 1/2 cups coconut sorbet, melted
• 1/2 cup toasted coconut ice cream, melted
• 3 eggs

For the glaze:

I made my stand-by glaze with powdered sugar and pineapple soda, drizzled onto the cakes after they had cooled.