Cupcakes Across America: House of Cupcakes - Princeton

Like every home baker and lover of cupcakes, I watch Cupcake Wars  and am frantic as I see the professional bakers make big errors, or worry when they are trying something new but am mostly humbled by the creative artistry in both decoration and flavor.  So how lucky am I to frequently be in the neighborhood of such greatness with House of Cupcakes in Princeton?  I'm LUCKY!  They appeared on Cupcake Wars in 2011 and as you might notice in their pic below - they won!  YAY!!

How cute is their shop - so cute - so Princeton - so delicious.

I stopped by there for Big Mama's birthday celebration.  Having a string of birthdays all in a row, we were a little caked-out so a single serving portions were in order. I swung by HOC to pick up a six pack for our little celebration.  They have up to twenty flavors on any given day and they are always so super nice.  They do minis too by advance order.  I got a mixed load on this day with Big Mama's favorite, Vanilla - or Vanilla Riot as HOC calls it, as the star: 

 

 

To fill out the mixer, I got a bunch of other flavors including Creme Brulee, Oreo & Peanut Butter cup. 

I've had a bunch of different flavors from HOC on many visits there.  The staff is always friendly and speedy in filling your order.  I've never had a bad experience or product out of this shop and their prices are reasonable - even for Princeton where everything is 10% more expensive.  I especially like their Red Velvet - so moist and for me, the exact cake to frosting ratio!

I <3 you House of Cupcakes!

Cupcakes Across America! The Cupcake Tree Santa Clarita, CA

And let's go back to California shall we?  Am I ever in the same time zone for more than a week at a time?  Well no - apparently not.  This trip back to CA was all over the place.  An hour before I had to go to my client's site, I found myself in Santa Clarita.  A quick google search on the iPhone found me The Cupcake Tree, and unassuming small cupcakery in a strip mall.  So often, I find myself in fancy schmancy places that if there's not a doorman saying hello, I'm prone to raising an eyebrown.  I'm judgemental - it's part of my charm.  And it assists in my snarkiness.   So when I see a tiny little shop with a nothing-fancy sign, I get a little worried.

Since I was there sortof near Easter, I was greeted by this cute little Peep cake:

And then I noticed their adorable cakepop selection:

And then finally, I notice their good selection of cupcakes:

They looked pretty good and there was a decent selection for what looked like a very small shop.  They had the standards:  Vanilla with vanilla buttercream which they cutely call "the blond" and red velvet with cream cheese frosting which they call "the southerner".  So cute names - I get it.  And a few other interesting flavors:  Vanilla Root Beer - vanilla cake with root beer buttercream,  Sweetart - a lemon cake with a lime frosting.  Then I noticed one called "Samoa".  Wait - like the girl scout cookies?  Turns out - YEAH!  This cupcake was amazing.  A coconut "infused" cake with caramel in the middle, topped with chocolate buttercream, caramel drizzle and a few coconut flakes.  This tasted JUST LIKE the famous and somewhat dangerous cookie.  And the cake was sooo moist and delicious.  And the balance between cupcake and frosting was perfect. 

So the lesson here is don't let a strip mall small shop turn you off.  This was one of the best cupcakes I've had.  Not an original flavor combination but done so well that you don't even mind. 

One other note about this shop - their website has a link they call "SVC Supporter".  A click on this link brings you to a page where they explain that they support the business of the Valley of Santa Clarita, using local businesses to help support the community.  And even playing music from local musicians.  What this shop lacks in size, they make up for in quality and class.  Get thee to Santa Clarita for the Cupcake Tree.

More Cupcakes Across America! VEGAS STYLE!

Sometimes in life, you’ve got to roll the dice.  Other times, you’ve got to know when to fold ‘em or hold ‘em.  And sometimes, you’ve just got to double down.  And that’s exactly what I did on my recent trip to Vegas.  Partly for work and partly for a girls’ weekend in a cabana @ Mandalay Bay surrounded by 1200 marines! – yeah – marines – and it wasn’t even my birthday.  Anywho, when the dealer gives you 7 days in Vegas, you must try at least two cupcake joints. 

First – and my apologies for not having any photos of it – The Cupcakery in Monte Carlo.  I had to walk right by it to get to Starbucks in the morning.  These cupcakes were good.  I got a Lemon Crème – it was good – moist, sweet yet tart.  A solid showing from this three location spot.  I also got a sample of the Julius – orange pineapple cake with a heavy cream frosting.  That one was good – a strong flavorful cupcake but the frosting wasn’t my fave. Nonetheless, good texture cake.

Then – The Sugar Factory.  This place is fun – part restaurant, part bar, and part candy/treat shop with their largest location in the Paris Casino Hotel on the strip and then a few other mini-shops around town.   Here's a pic from one of the mini-shops:

They make some questionable decisions on celebrity promotion:

Just kidding sitch!  We should hang out!

I went to the restaurant for dinner and it was quite good for an American style brasserie.  I had a salad and picked some onion rings and other treats from my friend’s plate.  They did have some creative ideas – macaroni and cheese pops – really – balls of mac and cheese in battered ball form and deep fried onto a stick.  Pretty brilliant.    For the cupcake test, I picked up a vanilla cupcake at the Sugar Factory mini-shop in the Miracle Mile Shops in Planet Hollywood.  While there it occurred to us that this mall used to be in Aladdin.  Remember Aladdin?  Easy come, easy go in Sin City.  

Here's the cupcake - looks good right?  

Anyway, this vanilla cupcake was not good.  Way too dry and crumbly texture and seemed stale.  The frosting was like a whipped shortening which was barely sweetened.  And is often the case with dry cake, the sides did not hold up - look at this side of this poor little guy:

Finally, the saving grace of the Sugar Factory, is the cute merch.  They have all kinds of candy, giant lollipops, and even cakepops.  And what goes better with that than an adorable rubber ducky to make the trip home with you.

More cupcakery reviews to come as I head back out west!  

Bakery Review: Deerfields Baker - Chicagoland

This review brings me to Chicago.   What a great city.  Underappreciated I think because it's cold but sometimes you get lucky and get a few hours to yourself in Chicago on a warm sunny spring morning.  The obvious thing to do is to find a bakery and so I turn to Yelp to point me to something nearby where I had a meeting and I got lucky in that I was directed to Deerfields Bakery. 

It was later that I looked at their website and found their true American dream story.  Deerfields is owned by the Schmitt family whose baking roots began in Germany in the 1880s. In 1911, Adam Schmitt imigrated to American and he and his wife set up "The New York Bake Shop" in Chicago.  His son then started Schmitt's Bake Shop which expanded to over 30 locations.  As they say - bigger business means bigger problems (I don't know who "they" are - I'm pretty sure I just made that up.  The expansion forced Henry to lose his business.  But, because this is the American dream, he apparently just continued to work hard in the industry until he was able to buy another bakery in 1972:  Deerfield Bakery.  Twelve years later, that bakery was National Retail Bakery of the Year.  Who doesn't love a comeback story like that?!  Deerfields now has three locations in the Chicagoland area and I was lucky enough to stumble upon their newest one in Schaumburg, IL.  New as in - opened in 2000.  So essentially, these guys are totally legit.  Too legit to quit (sorry - had to!).

While they did not have a huge selection of cupcakes, they did have a little bit of everything.  See the selection of fresh muffins and donuts: 

And the cute Easter-ready lamb and chick mini-cakes:

They also had a load of bagels, breads, and a whole gluten free section!  AMAZIN! 

But this day I had a hankering for Red Velvet!  Luckily, I had two really good options:  red velvet cupcake and red velvet DONUT!  Um - what?! 

I ended up getting both (don't judge).  They were both flat-out amazing!  The red velvet donut was actually - donut-y - not too dense but still had all the flavors of red velvet.  AND it had the cream cheese frosting and a light dusting of powdered sugar.  Bask in the awe of red velvet magic by Deerfields: