June 12, 2012
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Red Velvet Revolution
(originally published in Cityview)
Cupcakes are a 21st century super trend, even replacing layered cakes in many weddings. Martha Stewart wrote an entire book exclusively about them. The Food Channel airs multiple cupcake shows. A search engine quest turned up more than a dozen cupcake businesses in Des Moines. Not that many were real stores though, more like web sites for ordering cupcakes for delivery. Many offered free delivery too. There’s a drawback though. Wedding planners warn that some cupcake businesses don’t work out of inspected kitchens, nor carry insurance. As long as one doesn’t provide on-site retail sales, it’s legal in Iowa to make such products out of the house, even with dogs, cats or pests. I decided to stick to storefront cupcakes.
Carefree Patisserie operates in a quaint Valley Junction building. It’s no small business though – they just landed a contract with the state fair for 20,000 “fair squares.” Chef and operating partner Jennifer Strauss said she always sells ten fresh cupcakes flavors a day, from a repertoire of 101. Last week, a Blue Hawaii delivered pineapple rum cake with blue citrus butter cream. Strauss says butter cream is the most important ingredient in cupcakes. Hers is made in 60 to 80 gallon batches, by the company’s only male employee, with sugar that is uncooked when it’s added.
She also advised party planners to be sure that cupcake stands are sturdy – hers are all metal or acrylic and imported from London where the wedding cupcake fad originated. She suggested that for comparison sake, one should taste red velvet cupcakes “because they are the easiest to mess up. It’s very tricky the way your acid oxidizes your cocoa to turn it red.
The darker the red, the better the cake.” Having only tasted red velvet cakes that added food coloring to white cake, I didn’t even know authentic red velvet was a chocolate cake.
At Crème Cupcakes owner Christine Moffat said she’s moving to the old Great Harvest Bakery. When the move is complete, she will add dessert-only dinner service, with former Baru Pastry Chef Jess Dunn creating the menu. Moffatt thinks the key ingredient in cupcakes is butter. She uses a high fat butter and never substitutes oil or shortening. “You don’t want the greasy aftertaste that shortenings like Crisco leave. And don’t put so much sugar in your frosting that you can’t taste the flavors.”
She described her red velvet cake as half Southern style (with cream cheese frosting and cider vinegar for oxidizing acid) and half Waldorf style (adding vanilla). She said she always uses vanilla paste, never extract.
At The Bake Shoppe in Windsor Heights, long loved for rye bread and petit fours, I found ten different flavors of cupcakes.
At $1 to $1.25 they were considerable less expensive than the others I found, even from delivery-only services.
Bottom line – Carefree’s red velvet was the most chocolaty and deepest red. Crème’s was subtler with both vanilla and chocolate tones and the airiest texture. Bake Shoppe’s frosting was by far the sweetest and its crumb hardly tasted of chocolate at all.
Side Dishes
Baru 66 collaborated with Carefree Patisserie to sell out two sittings, on a Monday, for this all dessert menu: Smoked pork belly with caramel corn shake; Foie gras mousse with rhubarb confit; Tuna tataki with wasabi sorbet and ginger espuma; Minestrone with cheese panna cotta; Cocoa rubbed ribeye with white chocolate Bernaise; Sophia ashed chevre with brown butter cake, apple relish and Calvados jelly; Chocolate mousse torte with hazelnut praline, chocolate ganache, brandied cherries and cherry sorbet.
Bake Shoppe
6611 University Ave., Windsor Heights, 255-2253, Mon. – Sat. 7 a.m. – 5 p.m., Sun. 8 a.m. – 2 p.m.
Crème Cupcakes
1701 South Union St., 554-9007, Tues. – Fri. 10 a.m. – 5 p.m., Sat. 10 a.m. – noon
Carefree Patisserie
304 5th St., West Des Moines, 277-0705, Tues. – Wed. 11 a.m. – 4 p.m., Thurs. – Fri. 11 a.m. – 5:30 p.m., Sat. 10 a.m. – 3 p.m.
