Peace sign cupcake cake, rocky red velvet cupcakes and more from LA Sweets

These fun cupcakes are all by Miami's LA Sweets, via their Facebook page. Visit lasweets.net for more information.




rocky red velvet!




chocolate marshmallow with vanilla buttercream






peanut butter and jelly

5 more Diamond Jubilee cupcakes

We posted a Diamond Jubilee cupcake roundup, a Union Jack cupcake cake, Diamond Jubilee cupcake toppers and there are more coming soon, but here are 5 Diamond Jubilee cupcakes. If you've made or seen any we should know about, email us at cupcakesatakethecake at gmail.com with "Jubilee" in the subject line.


Red velvet cupcake made with vanilla sponge with cocoa powder and red food coloring by Vanilla Jo


by The Cupcake Oven in Chelmsford, UK, as part of a sugarcraft competition


Union Jack flag cupcake sent in by reader Stephanie Owen, sold at Prego Italian restaurant in Brighouse, West Yorkshire,


by Cambridge and Boston, Massachusetts bakery Sweet, via @SweetCupcakes_ on Twitter, one of the few U.S. bakeries I've seen doing Jubilee cupcakes


by Cupcake Revolution in Wallasey, UK, via Facebook

Red velvet waffle cones, red velvet cupcake topping, cupcake ice cream sandwiches, root beer floats and more at Sprinkles Ice Cream grand opening today in Beverly Hills

I'll share more soon about why the hot cupcake trend of 2012 is cupcakes and ice cream, with bakeries incorporating ice cream into their shops in all sorts of ways, but right now I want to tell you about today's Beverly Hills opening at 10 a.m. of Sprinkles Ice Cream, located at 9631 South Santa Monica Boulevard, adjacent to the original Sprinkles Cupcakes bakery and the 24-hour Sprinkles Cupcake ATM. Their website says national shipping is coming soon. You can get a root beer float, various flavors of ice cream (see below), and an ice cream sandwich where the ice cream is sandwiched between cupcakes or a red velvet waffle cone. You can follow them at @sprinklesicecrm on Twitter for the latest news. Their hours are Thursday-Saturday 10-11 and Sunday-Wednesday 10-10, and they can be reached at icecream at sprinkles.com or 310-274-7890. If anyone visits this week and wants to write a guest post about it, email us at cupcakestakethecake at gmail.com with "Guest Post" in the subject line.

These photos are from Sprinkles Ice Cream's Facebook page, where I learned:

Keeping with Sprinkles modern aesthetic, architect Andrea Lenardin designed a new take on the old fashioned scoop shop. Sprinkles Ice Cream is blanketed with white corian and penny tile offset by rich pops of red. While “chilling” on the spacious indoor-outdoor bench, ice cream enthusiasts will delight in decoding Thomas Jefferson’s ice cream recipe inked onto the overhead rotunda.

Here are the ice cream flavors they're offering: banana, butter pecan, cap'n crunch, cherry vanilla, chocolate chip, chocolate sorbet (dairy free), coffee, coffee almond fudge, dark chocolate, malted milk chocolate, mint chip, peanut butter, pistachio, Sprinkles Red Velvet, rocky road, salty caramel, strawberry, strawberry sorbet (dairy free), triple chocolate, vanilla bean. Cookie flavors are: chocolate chip, double chocolate, peanut butter pretzel chip, salted oatmeal cornflake, snickerdoodle, fudge brownie.

From their Facebook page, here's how to make a


Sprinkles red velvet ice cream


they offer sauces including salted butterscotch, hot fudge or chocolate crackle


dark chocolate ice cream


cupcake ice cream sandwich


red velvet waffle cones


root beer float


pirate cupcakes from the Sprinkles Facebook page, so cupcakes don't feel left out of this post

In other Sprinkles news, their Cupcake ATM photo contest ends May 31st!

Red velvet lobster cupcakes, anyone?

I don't know if I'd want actual lobster in my cupcake (seems like a waste to me) but adorable decorated lobsters as red velvet cupcake toppers? Yes, please! By bakery OMG Baked Goodness in Toronto, via their Facebook page. Visit omgbakedgoodness.com for more information, or contact them at info at omgbakedgoodness.com or 647-348-5664 for custom orders.

Review: very crumbly but delicious chocolate red velvet cupcake at Crumbs

Today I passed by a Crumbs Bake Shop I hadn't seen before, even though it's been in Chelsea on 6th Avenue for 6 months. It was very clean and while they didn't have the candy that other Crumbs are offering, they had an array of cupcakes. I bought 2 cupcakes for a total of $7.90, the 550 calorie chocolate red velvet cupcake and the cherry blossom cupcake. I'll review the cherry blossom separately in a comparison post, but I liked the idea of chocolate red velvet because I'm not a cream cheese frosting fan, and usually that's what's paired with red velvet.







This red velvet cake was very moist and taste, and went well with the sweet and chooclatey-frosting. I'd say it's among my favorites at Crumbs, however, it was very crumbly, as evidenced below. I used the stirrer to scoop up some frosting (I didn't see any knives out) and the red velvet cake got all over my table, my hand and my Nook! Visit crumbs.com for location and cupcake information.

On location: charity red velvet cupcakes at Georgetown Cupcake SoHo

On location: charity red velvet cupcakes at Georgetown Cupcake SoHo, a photo by Rachel from Cupcakes Take the Cake on Flickr.

Is Red Velvet Problematic?

The sign in Robicellis shop in Dekalb Market

Six months ago, I organized an event called,"The Red Velvet Cake Debate".  It  was not really a debate but more of a discussion about what makes a classic red velvet cupcake/cake and about baking in general. Allison Robicelli was the lone panelist who was against "red velvet", but since then I have met many other people who don't like red velvet because of the unnatural color, the cream cheese frosting and whole host of reasons. Taste is one's personal opinion, so it's OK to like, love or hate red velvet. . I have asked several bakery owners about red velvet cupcakes, and  for those who bake them, the red velvet is one of their top three selling cupcakes.

How is Red Velvet problematic?  It's either the beetles or the beets! The red in red velvet is often created by using food coloring.  This red dye is often made from cochineal extract derived from beetles. The old school way to create the red is to make a red food coloring using beets. You can do that, but that is kinda labor intensive. Honestly,  I have had red cupcakes made with beets, and they can be good, but that intense red color doesn't appear like it does with red dye food coloring.

I personally love a red velvet when the cupcake is moist, the presence of cocoa is more than a hint, the  buttermilk and vinegar are in balance so that the cake doesn't taste metallic and the cream cheese frosting has a bit of mascarpone in it. Recently,  I have created a "Google Alert" on  red velvet, as I have become fascinated with the emergence of red velvet brownies, cheesecake, ice cream, waffles and whoopie pies.  Now I am curating red velvet board on Pinterest to catalog the infiltration of red velvet across both desserts and breakfast items.  Red velvet is very popular and with many things that are popular, there may be a backlash, but for now, it is  so cool  how far red velvet will go.  A friend of mine wants to make red velvet fried chicken.  I can't wait to try!

Skinny Red Velvet Cupcakes

via skinnytaste.com

Has the upcoming swimwear season got you down? No worries, you can still have your cupcake fix even if you're on a bikini diet! Gina of skinnytaste.com has developed these Skinny Red Velvet Cupcakes for the diet conscious! If you've never heard of skinnytaste.com you definitely should check it out! She has nutritional information and Weight Watchers Points Plus totals for all her recipes! These cupcakes end up being 3 points per cupcake but for a sweet treat like Red Velvet, those are sure to be points spent wisely! Check out her recipe here!

Tori Spelling's red velvet cupcake recipe, game night domino cupcakes and party planning tips galore in her new book celebraTORI

Tori Spelling has a new book out called celebraTORI: Unleashing Your Inner Party Planner to Entertain Friends and Family. It's not about cupcakes per se, but there are cupcakes on the cover and scattered throughout the book, including the personalized ones below, and she walks you through every step of party planning, from where to host it, how to do your invitations (she is not a fan of Evite), to planning the atmosphere, theme, food, drinks, games, party favors, and beyond. Tori shares her own highs and lows and tips for all kinds of parties on a budget. It's a beautiful book and I will be sharing more tomorrow; I'm going to a book party for celebraTORI and, if you'll allow me a fangirl moment, I'm very excited to get to meet her! Tori's site, ediTORIali, also regularly features cupcakes like these red velvet cupcakes (click through for the recipe!). You can follow her on Twitter @torianddean.





For a game night party, Tori writes this about the dessert table:

Surrounding the vintage ephemera were the desserts. There were cupcakes, of course, each one with a different scrabble tile cookie. Balanced against the real dominos were cookies decorated to look like dominos. And near the Bingo spinner were white Bingo ball cake lollipops and sugar cookies iced to look like Bingo cards. To fill out the table, I made mini cupcakes--chocolate with white icing an red candy on top.

Tori's red velvet cupcakes

A little red velvet cake heart goes a long way as a cupcake topper

All of these cupcakes are by Taste Love Cupcakes in Royal Oak, Michigan, via their Facebook page. I love how the tiny red hearts pop and make these cupcakes extra special. Find out more at tastelovecupcakes.com and contact them at eat at tastelovecupcakes.com or 248-543-2253.