Cupcake Maddness

We have already established that my weekend in Louisville was one filled with food! What with Lynn's, Hammerheads and Ramsi's it was a weekend of delicious feasting. I like food, sue me! Anyway, we couldn't just go to Louisville and have all that savory goodness and call it quits there...oh no, I've got a sweet tooth to sustain. And it was my birthday weekend after all.

Antoine and I have been on a bit of a cupcake kick lately! We're mad about Cincinnati's own Abby Girl Sweets (best carrot cupcakes EVER!). And after a recent trip to Indy I had to bring back some tasty confections from the Flying Cupcake (two thumbs up)! It seemed only natural to check out some cupcakeries while we were in Louisville! On Saturday we stopped by The Cupcake Shoppe to pick up a couple of after dinner/late night snacks. The shop was cute enough, the decor and the presentation of the cupcakes kind of reminded me of Cincinnati's Sugar Cupcakery in Milford. We decided on a banana chocolate cupcake and some chocolate number with vanilla buttercream...

The verdict: Meh. The cake was dry. The frosting was good, but not stellar. I was underwelmed!

On Sunday we drove to the outskirts of Louisville to check out Gigi's Cupcakes. I was a little worried about this one since it was a chain and all, but their cupcakes just looked so darned good online we had to check them out! We decided to go crazy and get 4 cupcakes for the road, deeming it an early Valentine's day gift to ourselves...

Clockwise from the left: White Midnight Magic, Chocolate Covered Strawberry, Italian Cream Wedding Cake, and Kentucky Bourbon Pie

Chocolate covered strawberry. I loved the ganache...all cupcakes should have a ganache!

Italian cream wedding cake. Quite tasty, although the cake as a tiny pit dry! The toasted coconut was delicious!

Kentucky Bourbon pie was almost part cupcake, part blondie! It was packed full of pecans and chocolate chips, making it dense and delicious!

Sorry, no close up of the White Midnight Magic, but it was my least favorite of the group. All of the cupcakes were good, but I think the Kentucky Bourbon pie was my favorite (with the Chocolate Covered Strawberry coming in at second). Were they better than Abby Girl cupcakes? NO! No way, Jose! But they were tasty. My only criticism is while the piled high frosting was visually appealing, it was a tad overwhelming to the taste buds. Half a cupcake at a time was pretty much all I could handle; any more was a bit too much sugar/sweetness in one sitting! But still, they are very tasty, pretty cupcakes...especially for a chain cupcakery.