Cooking recipes

My friend Chris woke me up, uhhh, I mean texted me Saturday afternoon. Its always fun to hear from Chris. We have equally superior taste in fashion than everyone else, which is why we get along. I know Chris because we used to work together, but now hes in law school. BORRRRING.

Anyway, he texted me because he was in the city for a bar exam prep class. Its ironic because Chris is admittedly one of the laziest people I know, but somehow he managed to make the trek out from BFE for a class downtown on a Saturday afternoon. So he texted me and asked if I wanted to hang out, catch up, maybe get a cupcake after class. Did someone say cupcake?! Im there.

We grabbed a little lunch then decided to try the cupcakes at Larrys. Now, for all you who dont live in Dupont Circle, Larrys is historically an ice cream shop. However, last winter they started selling "homemade" cupcakes. Probably because the ice cream business slows when its 15 degrees out. Its just a guess.

Despite their new menu item, I hadnt tried them in all the 7 months or so since they began selling them. Could be because I already have my favorites; could be because the people that own the shop run the place like the Soup Nazi from Seinfeld, which makes the entire process of choosing your ice cream quite stressful. Suffice it to say, I figured, with Chris by my side, this would be an opportune time to give the place a try.


The selection was pretty mediocre. Ice cream is still their line of business, lets not forget. But they had the basics--red velvet, chocolate, vanilla--and they had one interesting flavor, key lime filled with mango, topped with coconut icing. The man working the counter, presumably "Larry", made me feel welcome, saying "hey cutie, how can I take your money?" Its really nice to know that chivalrys not dead.

Chris ordered the mango-coconut thing:

I ordered the chocolate with sweet cream icing:


(Im totally Lady Gaga-ing in this picture.)

They werent the most attractive cupcakes. The icing was haphazardly piped on in stacked swirls. It obviously doesnt make the cupcake taste any better, but when youre in the cupcake biz they should look really pretty and neat.

My cupcake smelled really good. The icing gave me some concern right away though. It was definitely airy, definitely homemade, but it was SO buttery.

I love buttercream as much as the next cupcake-maniacal-Lady-Gaga-obsessed-red-head, but this was plain greasy. The cake had a light texture, a delicate crumb...it reminded me of something.


Hmmm. What is it?


Wait. No...couldnt be. But the sign, it says homemade.


Yep, this was definitely from a mix. The cake was far too light to have the same butter content as a homemade product. A homemade cake is much more dense than the kind you get from a box. Larrys just made $3 off the one cupcake I bought, which is about what it cost them to make the batch of 24. Cant blame them for a creative business model!


Chriss cupcake, on the other hand, wasnt from a mix, which was nice, but the icing was still too greasy. There wasnt much mango filling either. Overall, not a terrible cupcake, but theyve got to do something about their icings. A little vanilla bean would definitely help, and obviously more sugar. They should also whip the butter a little longer to make it fluffier so you dont feel like you need a triple bypass afterward.


Im glad we went, mostly because it gave me fodder for the blog, and because it was fun to see Chris get hit on by the dude working at Starbucks, but I probably wont go back. Im annoyed by the employees more than ever and Im pretty sure Im still sweating butter.