The Cupcake Addict's Cupcake Collection

Author Archives: MLea

• Bakery Nouveau’s Mini Snowball cake

  Posted at 6:40 pm by MLea

  Dec 27th

  So this isn’t REALLY a cupcake, but what is a cupcake, really?  Isn’t it just a little cake.

  I absolutely LOVE Bakery Nouveau in West Seattle.   Mr Shuck, his parents and I stopped by for a little treat after shopping at the West Seattle Farmers’ Market.   The in-laws got scones and Danish (boring).  I got this amazing little Snowball cake, described on their website as follows:  “Our rich vanilla cake, layered with coconut cream and milk chocolate crémeux.”

  

  Mini Snowball Cake from Bakery Nouveau: Click to enlarge

  This is an amazing cake: extremely moist and soft cake layers (probably explains why it’s a little wonkey), sweet and rich chocolate filling in the middle, nice coconut flavor.   Mr Shuck and I both loved it.  Rating: ♥♥♥♥

  Posted in Miscellaneous Bakeries | Tagged Bakery Nouveau, coconut, Snowball

• Happy Boxing Day!

  Posted at 8:58 am by MLea

  Dec 26th

  Last night, I made Carrot Ginger Cupcakes.  I was making the flour/gravy base cream cheese icing as usual, but just before I was to put the flour mixture it, I realized it was still warm.  It would have melted the butter and cream cheese that I had already creamed, so I decided to leave it out.  The icing was just butter (2 sticks),  8 ounces of cream cheese, 1 tsp vanilla, and 2 cups of superfine sugar.  Creamy and delicious and not too sweet.

  Posted in Mrs Shuck's Creations | Tagged cream cheese icing

• Merry Christmas!

  Posted at 6:03 pm by MLea

  Dec 25th

  It was a cupcake Christmas at the Shuck house.  I have a few “thank you’s” to send out.  I will post photos eventually.

  To The Shucks, my in-laws:  Thank you for the Tiffany Cupcake charm.  It’s beautiful!

  

  Tiffany and Co. Cupcake Charm- Click to enlarge

  To Mr Shuck, my beloved:  Thank you for my Baker’s Manual so I can learn to bake.  Thank you for my custom “TheCupcakeAddict.com” T-shirt, and my Cupcake Addict recycled art.  I’m sorry that I did not buy you the electric motorcycle of your dreams.  Maybe when we move someplace that isn’t as wet and that has cushioned roadways….

  

  Cupcake Addict art from Recycled Art Co: Click to enlarge

  

  Cupcake Addict T-Shirt: Click to enlarge

  To Hadas, my friend:  Thank you for a new fancy (Martha Stewart) cupcake carrier.   I love it!  It’s customizable and smaller than the one that broke.

  Posted in Cupcake Stuff!

• Cupcake disappointment

  Posted at 2:22 pm by MLea

  Dec 20th

  So, after 2 weeks of having a horrible cold and sinus infection and having no cupcakes because my sense of taste was off, I am finally back to cupcake work.  Mr. Shuck was downtown and stopped by Yellow Leaf for me.  I don’t recall the other selections, but Chocolate Covered Cherry and Italian Eggnog appealed to me.  (Actually the eggnog didn’t appeal to me, but it was seasonal, so I gave it a shot.)

  

  YL's Chocolate Covered Cherry: Click to enlarge

  This cupcake wasn’t what I was expecting when i heard the name “chocolate covered cherry”.  I was expecting something very chocolatey with some cherry in the middle.  I was hoping and praying that there was no maraschino cherry hiding inside the cupcake somewhere.  At least I got that wish.  What I ended up with was a cherry flavored cupcake with a thin layer of chocolate on top topped with pink Italian meringue butter cream and a chocolate drizzle.  The cake was nice: firm and moist with a fine crumb, but it didn’t really have much flavor.  If I didn’t know it was supposed to be cherry, I couldn’t have identified it as being cherry.  The only chocolate was the layer between the icing and the cake and it did not have a very rich flavor.  The icing was okay, perhaps because the chocolate drizzle gave it a little extra texture.  I ate it.  That says something.  Rating:  ♥♥

  

  YL's Eggnog: Click to enlarge

  Italian Eggnog:  I’m not sure why it’s Italian Eggnog.  Maybe because of the Italian meringue butter cream on top?  You could probably go back and read my comments about the chocolate covered cherry because this will sound pretty familiar.  The cake was moist and firm with a fine crumb.  That’s probably true of all Yellow Leaf cupcakes.  I LOVE THEIR CAKE!  I have never had a dry crumbly cupcake from there.  It tasted like regular yellow cake to me, nothing to write home about, but no cake left in the container when I threw it away.  ON THE OTHER HAND….

  

  Eggnog icing headed to the trash

  I really liked Yellow Leaf’s Italian meringue butter cream icing at first.  It was not too sweet and had a texture similar to ice cream.  Lately, I guess my choices have had icing that isn’t strongly flavored, so I feel like I’m licking a stick of butter.   The mouth feel is slick and without strong flavoring, it just tastes like butter.  Rating for the cake:♥♥, Icing: ♥ so ♥ 1/2 overall.

  Posted in The Yellow Leaf Cupcake Company | Tagged chocolate covered cherry, eggnog

• Tender crumb

  Posted at 2:55 pm by MLea

  Dec 18th

  So, I’ll admit that I don’t know a lot about baking.  I’m learning.

  When I read that a recipe produces a cake with a moist, tender crumb, I have no idea what is meant.  I understand moist, but I don’t understand “tender crumb”.  I know what I like in a cake, but I don’t always know how to describe it to others with words more complicated than “yummy”, “good”, “dry”, or “I threw the rest in the trash.”

  These things I know:

  Have ingredients at the appropriate temperature:

  • Eggs should be around 80 degrees to provide maximum volume.  In the winter I’m going to be doing well to keep them above 65 degrees since that’s room temperature in my house
  • Butter should be between 60 and 70 degrees to best incorporate air when creamed with sugar.
  • Ideal batter temperature is 90 degrees for sponge cakes and 70 degrees for butter-type cakes.

  Cakes made with butter should be served at room temperature or they will be too firm.  Cakes made with oil can be served directly from the refrigerator.  So, if the icing needs refrigeration, the cake should be made with oil, not butter.

  You can use almost anything to flavor butter cream, but the flavoring should not exceed 1/2 the total weight of butter.

  If you are using Dutch process cocoa, which has been treated to decrease the acidity, you have to use baking powder instead of baking soda or your cake will not rise appropriately.  Baking soda can be used if there is another acidic ingredient in the recipe, like buttermilk.

  Posted in Miscellaneous

• Help me decide….

  Posted at 3:24 pm by MLea

  Dec 7th
  Posted in Poll

• HoneyMoon Bakery, Rome, GA

  Posted at 10:03 am by MLea

  Nov 30th

  While we were home for Thanksgiving, we visited the Honeymoon Bakery in Rome, GA.  (Twice!)

  Our selections:

  

  Chocolate Velvet Mini from Honeymoon Bakery: Click to enlarge

  The Chocolate Velvet was described as Red Velvet cake (without the red dye) with chocolate icing.   The icing was very creamy and had a rich chocolate flavor, but was a little too sweet.  The cake was moist, but didn’t have a definite chocolate flavor and was a bit crumbly.   I typically taste the icing and cake separately, then have a bite with both.   This one was definitely better all at once.   Rating: Cake ♥♥♥   Icing ♥♥.  Overall: ♥♥½

  

  Spice Mini from Honeymoon Bakery: click to enlarge

  Spice Cake Mini:  The cake was nice: moist and not crumbly, with light cinnamon/nutmeg(?) flavor.  The icing seemed to have the same flavoring as the cake.  The colored sugar added to the cupcake aesthetically, but added a grainy texture and more sweetness, which definitely wasn’t needed.   The icing to cake ratio seemed a little high also: when tasted together, the icing overpowered the cake.  I’m not sure what flavor icing would have been better (maybe cream cheese), but a contrasting flavor icing would have made it more interesting.  Rating:  Cake ♥♥♥, Icing ♥, Overall ♥♥

  

  Caramel Mini from Honeymoon Bakery: Click to enlarge

  Caramel Mini Cupcake:  Like the spice cake, this cupcake seemed to have the same flavor cake and icing.   I tasted the icing first, so I may not have had a clean palate when I tasted the cake.  The cake was moist and not crumbly.  The icing had nice flavor, not the “burnt” sugar caramel taste that I don’t like.  Overall it just tasted sweet, though.  Not very interesting.  Rating:  ♥♥

  

  Italian Cream cupcake from Honeymoon Bakery: Click to enlarge.

  Italian Cream: coconut and walnut studded white cake topped with cream cheese icing, coated with more nuts and coconut.  Mr Shuck and I both really liked this cupcake.  We ended up going back another day for second one.  The first cupcake was really moist and had a nice texture from the walnuts.  The second one, however, was a little dry and crumbly.  The icing was tangy from the cream cheese and there was just the right amount of it.  The coconut and walnuts on the icing added interest.   If we hadn’t gotten the second cupcake, the rating probably would have been a bit higher, but the dry cake the 2nd time around lowered the rating a bit.  Cake: ♥♥♥, Icing ♥♥♥♥; Overall ♥♥♥½.

  

  Carrot Cupcake from Honeymoon Bakery: click to enlarge

  The carrot cake was very moist and had large shreds of carrot visible, but without an abundance of carrot flavor.   However, it was a bit underdone in the center and a bit wet.  The icing was smooth and creamy and had the right balance of sweet and tangy.  It was also very cute.  I assume the brown crumbs were chocolate cookie crumbs, but they didn’t add chocolate flavor, just a bit of texture.  Overall rating: ♥♥♥.

  All in all, I was impressed with the cupcakes at Honeymoon Bakery.   The staff was very friendly and cheerfully answered my questions about ingredients.  I would definitely go back if we are in the area.

  Posted in Miscellaneous Bakeries | Tagged caramel, Carrot, chocolate velvet, Honeymoon Bakery, Italian Cream, Rome, spice

• Happy Birthday, Sofie!

  Posted at 9:31 am by MLea

  Nov 25th

  Today, Sofie turned 5!  She was treated with a carrot and apple pupcake from West Seattle Dawg. Her rating was 4 paws.  I thought the cupcake was extremely cute.

  

  Carrot Apple Pupcake from West Seattle Dawg: click to enlarge

  

  Sofie about to attack her pupcake: click to enlarge.

  Posted in Pupcakes | Tagged Pupcakes, West Seattle Dawg

• Milk chocolate hazelnut butter, but not Nutella

  Posted at 8:36 am by MLea

  Nov 22nd

  On a trip to Central Market to buy chocolate, I saw that they had grind-your-own milk chocolate hazelnut butter in the nut butter area.  I will be attempting to bake something with it soon.  It’s a rough grind, so the hazelnuts are grainy.  There’s no added sugar apart from what’s in the chocolate so it’s not as sweet as Nutella®.  It tastes yummy and would make a nice cupcake filling.   Nutella® is a bit too thick and sticky unless its heated.    (A perfect example of heated Nutella is a lovely Nutella brioche purchased at the Thriftway earlier in the week.  I wish I had photographed before eating since it was cupcake-esque….maybe a repeat visit for a future post.)

  I did photograph the chocolate hazelnut butter nestled in its plastic container.  I decided against posting since it ended up looking more like a laboratory sample than a pastry filling.

  Posted in Miscellaneous

• No Godiva Cupcakes, so New York Cupcakes

  Posted at 8:03 pm by MLea

  Nov 21st
  

  Godiva cupcakes, image stolen from their website since I didn't find any.

  Our original goal today was to get a cupcake at the Godiva store, mainly because we have a Godiva gift card.  Free cupcakes are sometimes the best cupcakes.  However, we apparently misunderstood Godiva’s website.  Even though the icon that means “Godiva Stores offering baked goods” was next to the Bellevue Square location, we didn’t see any baked goods at the store.   DARNIT!    Maybe one day I’ll be willing to order Godiva cupcakes from their website but (surprisingly enough) I am not enough of an addict to pay $51.95 for 6 cupcakes ($28 for cupcakes and $21.95 for overnight shipping).    Update 11/23: Cupcakes are only available from the website, so I guess I don’t be trying them any time soon.

  After wandering around Bel Square for a bit, we headed out to Trader Joes.  On the way, we were sidetracked by New York Cupcakes. We chose the following 4 cupcakes.  (I really didn’t want 4, but there was a discount with 4 which netted us 4 cupcakes for $10.)   The descriptions in italics are from the NY Cupcake website. My reviews follow.

  

  Boston Cream Pie from NY Cupcakes- click to enlarge

  Boston Cream Cutie Pie
  Classic white cake filled with creamy vanilla custard, topped with decadent dark chocolate frosting and finished with a dollop of whipped buttercream on top.
  

  The vanilla cake was very moist and had distinct vanilla flavor.  The custard was indeed creamy, but I didn’t find the chocolate frosting to be all that decadent: it was a little grainy and too sweet for me.  The cupcake was cute .  Rating: ♥♥ ½

  

  Grand Central S'mores from NY Cupcakes- click to enlarge

  Grand Central Smores
  Get on board with our classic chocolate cake topped with sweet marshmallow buttercream frosting and finished off with golden graham cracker crumbs and a mini Hershey Bar .

  This cupcake is incredibly cute.  I love the mini Hershey® bar on top.  It makes it seem more home-made and less “snooty”.  Review to come.  I’m full right now. The cake was really nice…might have been the same cake batter as the Milky Way, but my palate isn’t that advanced: moist with deep chocolate flavor.  It had a sticky marshmallow fluff sort of filling that I really liked and a graham cracker crust at the bottom…or the crumbs might have sunk before baking.  I couldn’t finish the frosting:  way too sweet.  I guess if the bakery is calling it “sweet…frosting” rather than just “frosting”, it’s got to be overloaded with sugar.    Rating: ♥♥.  It would have been ♥♥½ or ♥♥ if it had the marshmallow fluff on top instead of the frosting.

  

  Midtown Milky Way by NY Cupcakes: Click to enlarge

  Midtown Milky Way
  Our best flavors have come together! Classic chocolate cake filled with white fluffy buttercream and topped with a swirl of creamy caramel and fudge frosting.

  The caramel frosting was the best caramel frosting I’ve had lately.  Maybe it wasn’t “authentic” caramel: it didn’t taste like burnt sugar to me, so I liked it.  The chocolate part of the swirl seemed to be the same chocolate frosting that was on the Boston Cream, but it seemed better when diluted a bit by the caramel frosting.  The cake was moist and chocolate-y, but I didn’t think the butter cream filling added anything to the mix.  Rating: ♥♥ ½

  

  I Love PB&J by NY Cupcakes- click to enlarge

  I Love PB&J
  Not your ordinary lunch treat! Classic white cake filled with raspberry jelly buttercream and topped with a swirl of creamy peanut butter frosting.

  Disclaimer:  I don’t like raspberries, so that may taint my rating somewhat.   Mr Shuck thought it didn’t have a distinct enough jelly flavor compared to the peanut butter and mused that it might be better with jelly in the center rather than flavored frosting inside.  The peanut butter taste was very strong in the icing, but the icing was creamy instead of grainy so that was a plus.  The cake was moist and I have no complaints about it.   (Mr Shuck said the cake was delightful.)  My rating: ♥ ½.  Mr Shuck’s rating: ♥♥♥.

  New York Cupcakes overall is worth a trip back, despite it being 17.63 miles from my house according to Mapquest.  I’d probably not make a special trip out to Bellevue, but would go out of my way if in the Bellevue area.

  
  

  Posted in Miscellaneous Bakeries | Tagged boston cream, Godiva cupcakes, Milky Way, New York Cupcakes, peanut butter and jelly, S'mores

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