However you look at boxed cake mix—a desperate measure for desperate times or a jumping-off point for an infinite number of delicious desserts—here are our best strategies to make it taste better than you ever imagined.
Pillsbury test kitchen home economists have heard it all. When they told me some people were adding melted ice cream to a cake mix, I couldn't believe it. Well, that's precisely what I did with this fun recipe. Choose your flavor and let the ice cream melt. The only trick is that you must have 2 cups of melted ice cream. For super-premium ice creams with little overrun, that's 1 pint frozen. But for less expensive brands with a lot of air piped in, you'll need to begin with more than a pint.
I made this cake with several flavors of ice cream and our favorite was a super-premium from Ben & Jerry's — Cherry Garcia. With cherry and chocolate pieces and the cream and the eggs in the ice cream, you need little else. Your liquid, your fat, and your flavorings are all in the melted ice cream. This recipe works well, too, in a 13- by 9-inch pan.
