Who Makes the Best Cupcakes?

Today Cupcakes Take the Cake linked to a MSN article entitled The Country's Best Cupcakes.  In the article author Amanda Petrusich gives her picks for the country's 11 most original and most delicious cupcakes.

As soon as I spied a cupcake from Chicago's Cupcakes on the list, a red flag went up.  Both cupcakes I had from there were a disaster, and their reviews on Yelp are pretty mixed.  I immediately wondered, had Ms. Petrusich actually sampled her selections?  Just how many cupcakeries had she visited, in her quest to find the country's top eleven cupcakes?

In response, I'd like to present The Top Eleven Cupcake Shops Violet has Visited.  Coming from a scientific background, I feel that a few disclaimers are in order:

1. I have not visited every cupcakery/bakery in the world, nor sampled every cupcake said shops offer.  Obviously, I cannot definitively say that these are the best places in the world; that's why I'm calling this list "The Top Eleven Cupcake Shops Violet has Visited", and not "The Top Eleven Cupcakeries in the World!!11!!1!"
2. Everyone's palate is different.  These are my favorite places.  Your mileage may vary.
3. To date I've sampled almost 250 cupcakes from 56 cupcakeries and bakeries around the world.  These are the creme of that crop.

Bittersweet
Chicago, IL
Technically Bittersweet is a patisserie, not a cupcakery, but the Carrot cupcake I had there far surpassed most carrot cakes I've had from "gourmet" cupcakeries.  And, at $2.00 a pop, their amazingly delicious, high-quality cupcakes are a total steal.



Cake Nouveau
Ann Arbor, MI
Cake Nouveau is a fantastically whimsical, gorgeous little cake shop.  In addition to slices of decadent looking cakes, they also offer a wide selection of exotic-sounding cupcakes.  Their Blueberry Morning won one of my elusive 5-star ratings, and the Chocolate Clementine was delightfully scrumptious as well.  Cake Nouveau's strength is definitely its art style -- their bright, playful store won "Cutest Store" during our Cross-Country Cupcake Crawl.

CoCo's Cupcake Cafe
Pittsburgh, PA
Okay, I'm not just biased because I live in Pittsburgh -- I've lived in many cities around the country and I have no special loyalty to "the Burgh".  It's just a plain truth that CoCo's makes some of the best cake in the country.  In fact, I've gotten totally spoiled on their moist, soft cakes -- all other cupcakes seem dry in comparison.  Their authentic Italian meringue buttercream is famous around Pittsburgh,  and their Carrot cupcake is the best carrot cake cupcake I've ever had.

Crumbs Bake Shop
New York, NY
The only "chain" cupcakery on my list, Crumbs has somehow managed to maintain a high-quality product while rapidly expanding their business to new locations around the country, unlike another chain-cupcakery I know of whose name rhymes with "twinkles".  Their Raspberry Swirl won one of my 5-star ratings, despite the fact that I hate raspberries.  At $3.50 each their cupcakes are a might expensive, but they're also ginormous and can easily be shared with a friend.

Cupcake Station
Birmingham, MI
Cupcake Station is amazing.  I have no idea how they mange to keep 26 (yes, that's right, twenty-six!) flavors in stock every day.  And they don't do it by skimping on quality!  We stopped by on our Cross-Country Cupcake Crawl and were blown away when we were served two 5-star cupcakes in rapid succession.  Their Strawberry Delight was named Best Cupcake of our entire Cross-Country Cupcake Crawl.

Dots Cupcakes
Pasadena, CA
Looking for an alternative to Sprinkles' dry cakes and Yummy's sugar bombs?  Dots is your place.  Sure the staff can be a little bit snarky, but the delicious cupcakes are totally worth it.  Their cute, modern cupcakes are delectably moist, and they have one of the best strawberry cupcakes cakes I've ever eaten.  The frosting is a hair too sweet for me, but it's orders of magnitude better than Yummy's super-saccharine icing.

Dozen Cupcakes
Pittsburgh, PA
Well, at least Ms. Petrusich and I agree on one cupcakery!  And I'm not just biased because I live in Pittsburgh, I swear.  Dozen makes some of the best frosting in the country; their citrus frostings in particular are to die for.  I'm a cake person myself, but if you were to give me a bucket of their Key Lime frosting and hand me a spoon, I'd happily eat the whole thing in one sitting.  Other frosting aficionados may want to check out their Cosmo, Lemon, and Old-Fashioned Fudge frostings.

The Cupcakery
Las Vegas, NV
The Cupcakery's sign proclaims it to have "The Best Little Cupcakes in Las Vegas", and at the time of my visit I had to agree.  (Though two more cupcakeries have opened in Vegas since I last visited, so the current accuracy of that sign is questionable.)  Their thick, fudgy chocolate frosting is absolutely fabulous, and their Bugsy (carrot cake) cupcake garnered one of my 5-star ratings.

Pink Moon Cupcake Bakery
Powell, OH
When you think of gourmet cupcakes, Powell, Ohio is not exactly the first place that pops to mind.  That said, cupcake lovers visiting the Columbus area would be missing out big-time if they didn't take the 15 minute detour to Powell.  Not only does Pink Moon Cupcake bakery have a large selection of delicious (and exotic) cupcakes, they also have plenty of eclectically furnished seating space and the absolute cutest cupcake-packaging I've ever seen.  Be sure to try the cake on the Key Lime Margarita -- it's like eating a soft, fluffy cloud.

Primrose Bakery
London, England
With a bright, welcoming atmosphere, Primrose is a younger, fresher version of "Grandma's Kitchen".  A whiff of the fresh, warm cinnamon rolls on the counter is enough to distract a cupcake-lover from trying their cupcakes, but be sure to at least sample their chocolate buttercream (tastes just like Cadbury bars!) and their lime frosting.  Primrose excels at presentation -- our cupcakes were served to us on a glass pedestal cake platter with elegant china.

Wicked Bakery & Cafe
Phoenix, AZ
I hate Red Velvet cake, but even I had to admit that Wicked's Red Velvet cupcake was really freaking good.  I think the secret is Wicked's technique of covering their cupcakes with a special glaze before they frost them; locking moisture into the cake while simultaneously giving them an added zip.  The thick cream cheese frosting was sinfully rich; one of the best cream cheese frostings I've had.

Well, that's my pick for top 11 cupcake purveyors in the world (that I've visited).  I'll try to keep this list updated as I continue my cupcake travels.

Cross-Country Cupcake Crawl: Day 5

Phoenix, AZ & Scottsdale, AZ
Miles Traveled: 400
States Entered: 1
Cupcakes Consumed: 5

After we learned that it would be several days until an appraiser could come to the remote town we were stranded in and evaluate Baron's car, we decided to leave the car behind.  We felt really bad abandoning it, but there's a pretty good chance it's totaled anyway.  We spent the morning determining if it would be cheaper to ship all of our belongings and fly back to Pittsburgh, or rent a car and continue driving.  In the end, it seemed like driving would be the easier and cheaper option.  My dog Honey is locked up in a kennel outside of Pittsburgh so we can't really extend our trip to  make up for the lost day.  Ultimately we had to cut out Toronto.  Sorry Canada!  Hopefully we'll be able to make the short 4 hour drive from Pittsburgh to Toronto another time.

We arrived in Phoenix around 4:30pm, leaving us 90 minutes to visit four stores, the last of which closed at 6pm.  (Originally we were supposed to have spent last night in Phoenix giving us plenty of time to hit all of the stores this morning.)  We raced around the city in a non-linear fashion, hitting the stores in the order that they closed.  First up was Cupcake's Corner Cafe.

Cupcake's Corner Cafe
Phoenix, AZ
This cute little walk-up cupcakery is a recent expansion of Let Them Eat Cake, the bakery located next door.  The bright colors and custom painted walls make for a welcoming atmosphere while the checkerboard floor and retro barstools give the cupcakery a 50s feel.  I would say that the "Cafe" in the name is a bit of a misnomer -- though there are a couple of tall tables and barstools, it's not exactly a "sit down and sip a hot drink while reading a book" kind of place.  There's a table and two chairs outside on the sidewalk, but as we discovered in Las Vegas eating next to a parking lot isn't the nicest.

The refrigerated display case across from the entrance is full of delicious looking cupcakes.  We didn't see any plain vanilla chocolate cupcakes so we opted for the Orange Whiz (vanilla cake with lemon filling topped with an orange buttercream) and the CCC (lemon cake with raspberry filling topped with a chocolate cream cheese frosting).  The cakes in these cupcakes were fantastic, but unfortunately the below average frostings marred their delicious flavor.  Check out Cupcake's Corner Cafe's profile page for detailed reviews of the cupcakes.


Lulu's Cupcakes
Scottsdale, AZ
Don't let the vinyl banner sign in the abandoned-looking strip mall fool you.  Lulu's Cupcakes is one hip, modern bakery.  The cupcakery is much larger than it looks from the outside, with a long, L-shaped counter at the far end.  Lulu's menu is suspended above the counter, describing the flavors of the cupcakes perched on covered glass cake trays below.  Next to the entrance is a high counter with a handful of bar stools, and a couple of small two-person tables are lined against one of the longer walls.  Modern lighting fixtures hang from the ceiling above all of the seating areas.  The other long wall houses a display case full of all sorts of baking-related accessories and knick-knacks, as well as some totally random stuff.  (Baron was nice enough to buy me a cute purple rubber duck with devil's horns!)  A pair of large armchairs and a coffee table are located in the center of the store.  In general, the space in Lulu's seems largely empty and underutilized.  I'm guessing they're still pretty new.

Our selection at Lulu's included the Tantrum Tamer (vanilla cake with chocolate buttercream) and the Bunny Boo (carrot cake with cream cheese buttercream).  I found these cupcakes to be pretty much the exact inverse of Cupcake's Corner Cafe -- the frostings were simply divine, but the cakes were dry and muted.  You can read all about the cupcakes on Lulu's profile page.


Sweet Pea Bakery and Catering
Phoenix, AZ
We raced from Lulu's over to Sweet Pea Bakery only to discover that Sweet Pea was closed.  D'oh!  My itinerary mentioned that Sweet Pea was open from 10am to 5:30pm but they had a sign in their window proclaiming their summer hours to be 8:30am to 3:30pm.  Weird!  Usually places extend their hours in the summer, not make them shorter!


Wicked Bakery & Cafe
Phoenix, AZ
After the 40 minute detour to the closed Sweet Pea Bakery, we sped up north towards Wicked Bakery and Cafe.  After much nail biting and knuckle clenching we arrived at 5:55pm, five minutes before it closed.  We ran from the car up to the front door to discover the owner, Slade, locking up.  After explaining that we'd just driven from Vegas to try his cupcakes, he cheerfully led us inside.  Whew!

We spent the next 20 minutes chatting with the super-friendly Slade while stuffing our mouths with his delicious Red Velvet cupcakes.  Slade bakes the cupcakes himself and does a different flavor every day.  The chocoholic in me was disappointed to learn that he was baking a raspberry truffle cupcake tomorrow, but even though I'm not usually a fan of Red Velvet cake I had to admit his were pretty darn tasty.  Slade explained that their specialty is filled cupcakes and that he's made it a mission to bring moist cake to gourmet cupcakes.  (And yes, his Red Velvet cupcake was super moist.)  He also said that they cover all of their cupcakes in a special glaze before they frost them, which gives them an added zip.  He even showed us the fancy cupcake liners he gets from France that easily pull apart like an accordion, allowing you to remove the liner without getting frosting all over your fingers.  Neat!

Like Cupcake's Corner Cafe, the "Cafe" in Wicked's name is a bit of a misnomer.  I didn't notice any seating aside from a couple of barstools under a high counter along the front wall.  The space in the bakery was mostly taken up by the tall, refrigerated display case and several large refrigerators against a side wall.  If you're interested in sampling Wicked's cupcakes and you don't live near Phoenix, give them a call.  They ship their cupcakes!

As I mentioned above, Wicked's Red Velvet cupcake was super good.  The cake was moist with a nice mild chocolate flavor and the super rich frosting was to die for.  You can read a detailed description of it here on Wicked's profile page.


Dragonfly Cafe
Scottsdale, AZ
According to my data, Dragonfly Cafe closed at 8pm so we had a bit of breathing room after visiting Wicked.  We took the opportunity to photograph all of the cupcakes we'd acquired so far and transfer them to the Cupcake Courier.  With the courier at my feet and the air conditioning blasting, we set off for Dragonfly Cafe.

Unlike Cupcake's Corner and Wicked, Dragonfly was a real cafe with indoor and outdoor seating.  Unfortunately, like Sweet Pea Bakery, it had closed at 3pm.  Signs in the window revealed it too had shorter summer hours.  Darn!  I wish they'd updated their website with their new summer hours -- it still lists their closing time as 8pm!  Let this be a lesson to all you cupcake aficionados out there: call first before visiting a store to confirm its hours, especially if you are traveling a long distance to visit it!  (I had in fact called every store on our list to make sure they all were still selling cupcakes, but I didn't think to ask about shorter summer hours.)


And that was Phoenix and Scottsdale.  Next stop: Albuquerque!