Why Yes...I DO Crave Cupcakes

I read a LOT of cupcake blogs. And when they're not talking about baking cupcakes, they're talking about eating cupcakes. Most of these blogs are from people who live on the east or west coast, where you can't spit without hitting a cupcakery. However, for those of us in the south, say, Houston, for example...this is not the case. In fact, here, there are only 2 cupcake shops in all of Houston but they both sell other things. We do not have just a CUPCAKE shop.



...Until now.



Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you Crave Cupcakes. They are located in the Galleria area of Houston - the hippest place in town (high-brow, old money...the Bush Sr's live there). My friend A and I went to visit them today. They've only been open 5 weeks but with the amount of business I witnessed, I wouldn't be surprised if they were already breaking even.



I ordered the vanilla - just a simple vanilla bean cupcake with vanilla icing, rolled in yummy white sprinkles. ...I'm not gonna lie, folks...this was the greatest cupcake I have ever placed in my mouth. EVER. It was so different from any other vanilla cupcake I've eaten...so rich, SO flavorful. It was like an entire vanilla bean set up house in my mouth...but in a good way! A got the vanilla on chocolate - chocolate cake with vanilla icing (though decidedly a different icing than mine). It was also VERY amazing. The chocolate cake had just a hint of bittersweet cocoa without being actually bitter. I brought home one of their Dark Chocolate cupcakes...which I'll try later (since I've already had TWO cupcakes today...Weight Watchers, what?!)



I also fell in love with the store itself. It's located on the corner of a hip strip center and it's entirely encased by windows - and half of that is the kitchen. You can WATCH them baking and icing the cupcakes from the parking lot. And folks...I drooled. I drooled as I watched the lady plop the batter into the cupcake shells with her ice cream scoop. I drooled as the girl iced each and every cupcake. I even drooled watching the woman roll out the fondant. And I wasn't drooling because it all looked tasty, even though oh-holy-crap it DID. I drooled...because I wanted to BE everyone of those women! I want to be dolloping my cupcake batter into huge cupcake shells and icing my cupcakes and yes - even rolling out fondant!



*sigh*



Soon...very soon.