Chocolate mousse from Brasserie Jo

Brasserie Jo is a mini-chain in Boston and Chicago. The mousse was ruined by the fact that the white chocolate sauce they drizzled on it had soured. Oh well, at least that helped me with portion control.

http://brasseriejo.com/

 

Whole Foods kind of redeems itself

 

If you regularly read pie v. cake, you know that Whole Foods desserts usually stink. Well, this one doesn’t. Crunchy toasted slivered almonds, whipped cream frosting, fresh strawberries and moist vanilla cake inspired me to buy a mini-cake, and it wasn’t even anyone’s birthday. Just make sure to eat it within a couple days. The strawberries can go rancid quickly.

This cupcake is about 8 years old

And hard as a rock. I can’t remember what the back story is, but it’s become an objet d’art. It sits in a coworker’s office. How much $$ would you have to be paid for you to take a bite of it?

 

Sweet Cupcakes, Boston

Sweet is a relatively new cupcakery in the Back Bay area of Boston. I like how its refined aesthetic seems to be a reflection of the city, from its logo to the way the cupcakes are decorated. They even use edible gold leaf on their carrot cupcakes! 

I had the dark chocolate with chocolate icing, the strawberry shortcake and the Boston cream pie (not pictured). All were pretty darn good. I was hoping the icing on the dark chocolate would be more chocolate mousse-ish, but I found it to be a little grainy. And the dark chocolate cake reminded me too much of Devil Food’s cake mix.

I fared better with the other 2 flavors. The strawberry shortcake was as its name promised. Vanilla cake with a homemade strawberry preserves center, topped with whipped cream. Light and yummy. The Boston cream pie was different from any cupcake I’ve had. A chiffon cake (fluffy texture) with a cream center, topped with a chocolate ganache. It reminded me of an upcale Boston cream pie donut, minus the cloying sweetness.

Sweet also offers mini cupcakes that no mortal can resist. Seriously, when I brought them to the office, people were willing to cheat on their diets to get their lips around these puppies.

P.S.: I swear I’ll learn how to take a photo that’s actually in focus someday…

 

 

 

 

http://www.sweetcupcakes.com/index.html

***Update, 10/13/09: This place is Scientologist-approved. Suri Cruise ate here over the weekend. http://bit.ly/1pQjPT***

Balducci’s cupcakes: Frosting overload

Frosting-to-cake ratio is super important when it comes to perfecting the cupcake. Although Mr. X-sXe and I were delighted to find these cupcakes were “stuffed” with frosting, it didn’t make for very good eating.

The red velvet was decent, though the cream cheese frosting didn’t taste as fresh as it could have. The excess of frosting had me pining for more cake. Meanwhile, the cake part of the cookies and cream cupcake was Sahara dry. I couldn’t handle more than one bite. And that’s sayin’ something, for a sugar junkie. Mr. X-sXe had to begrudgingly polish off my half. In his words, “It’s not SO bad that I’m not gonna eat it!”

hello, hello cupcake!

so last week, i finally got to try the lovely hello cupcakes, which just opened in dupont circle. and it is delicious!
when we got there (6:30 pm on friday) most of the cupcakes were gone. mimi managed to snag one of each of the remaining flavors that they had:

here’s the de lime and de coconut that i purchased. i love lime and coconut, so i was looking forward to devouring this:

however, i found it to be slightly dry, although the icing was good.
amit had a coconut cupcake, which was much tastier. it was moist and the icing made me happy. look at him biting his lip in anticipation:

and the vegan? well, while hello cupcake does have vegan flavors, they were all out by the time we got there. so this is how the vegan felt:

we’ll go back to get vegan reviews soon! i promise!