Love At First Bite, Berkeley

Love At First Bite
1510 Walnut Street, Suite G
Berkeley, Ca 94709

Cupcakes tried: pretty in pink, lemon pistachio, mud pie, and matcha green tea

Overall reaction: Like at first bite

Along with my taste buds, I had another taster with me to help rate these lovely cupcakes. Thanks Shannon Linquist!

Let's start with the pretty in pink cupcake which was soooo pinkalicious! This cupcake consisted of strawberry cake and pink strawberry buttercream. It had a nice balance of tart and sweetness and tasted just like strawberries. The cake was baked perfectly. Strawberry Shortcake herself would be proud.

The lemon pistachio cupcake was a little disappointing. The cake was dry and you could hardly taste the lemon. It might as well have just been vanilla. The pistachio buttercream had the same problem with not enough of a distinct pistachio flavor. I love pistachio and lemon, so I was quite sad that this cupcake claimed to be both.

The mudpie was a yummy devil's food cake with mocha frosting and Oreo crumbs. The cake was nice and fudgy, a chocolate lover's delight. The Oreos were slightly smashed in the buttercream making them soft and I think it would have been better if they had a little crunch to them. I also would have liked a little more buttercream on top. Still, it was quite yummy.

The disaster of the afternoon fell upon the matcha green tea cupcake. First off, the color of the cupcake was hardly desirable. In the photo I took, it looks like a nice mint green color but in real life it looked like green puke/green pea baby food. Not good. The cake was dry and the icing was horrible tasting. I have to quote Shannon on this one, "Keep the green tea to mochi balls!"

My words of advice: It seems the cupcakes might be hit or miss here but definitely worth a try. The pretty in pink cupcake is for surely going down in my book of favorites.

Easter

What could be better than Easter cupcakes...lots and lots of Easter cupcakes.

So Sweet!

So my favorite San Francisco bake shop has a new location. If you have not yet been to Miette's, you should. It's as cute and as sweet as can be!
You can find the recently new shop in the Marina at 2109 Chestnut Street.

Go Golden Oaks!

Last week I baked and decorated sugar cookies for a parent meeting at Golden Oak Montessori School. These cookies were based on their logo. This is a unique school that was recently started by a group of parents who were passionate about having their children attend a good school that was an alternative to public school. I believe they had a good turn out at the meeting and everyone enjoyed the cookies!

Robot Cake

I'm completely operational and all my circuits are functioning normally--
Hal (2001, A Space Odyssey)

In honor of Steve's (my husband) 30th Birthday, I created the Robot Cake! Lots of fun ingredients involved like fruit loops, oreos and licorice ropes. Steve really likes all those old robot toys so that is where I gathered my inspiration. Here's the image that I modeled this cake after. And believe it or not, this Robot was completely eatable.

Oh Boy!

My friend Lesley and I threw a baby shower for our friend Jamie this past weekend. And of course I was in charge of cupcakes. I can't take credit for the concept as I got the idea from the book "Hello Cupcake" which has tons of unique ideas. But they were just so darn cute that I had to give it a whirl.

Alpine Bakery, Concord

Cupcakes tried: chocolate with fudge frosting, vanilla with vanilla frosting, chocolate with mocha mousse, carrot cake with cream cheese frosting, mango vanilla cake with mango mousse and shredded coconut
Also tried: variety of pastries

Overall reaction: Grocery store upscaled

These cupcakes were courtesy of my friend Lesley who was buying pastries for a baby shower and noticed that they also sold a variety of cupcakes. And, voila, she picked some up for me. Many thanks Lesley!

Their pastries were quite yummy...apple turnovers, cookies with fillings and other such danishes. However, the cupcakes left much to be desired. What a bummer!

Both the vanilla cupcake with vanilla frosting and the chocolate cupcake with fudge frosting were your typical grocery store cupcake. Slightly better but not by much. They were a little dry and the cake was rather bland. The vanilla cupcake was reminiscent of a Twinkie, it tasted almost exactly like one. I think I'd rather have a Twinkie though.

The chocolate mocha mousse cupcake was the same exact cake as the chocolate, so see above for description. The mocha mousse topping was actually quite delightful, light and fluffy.

Everything nice except sugar and spice describes the carrot cake. The cake was bland and it just lacked all those great cinnamon and nutmeg flavors of a really good carrot cake. The cream cheese frosting was decent.

The worst cupcake of the bunch was the poor mango vanilla cake. Same exact cake as the vanilla, so see above for description. The mango curd filling was actually pretty good, but the mango mouse on top with the shredded coconut was awful. For some reason the mango and the coconut turned on each other and created a disaster of a combination.

My words of advice: They are obviously better at making pastries, so stick to that.