wild wood bakehouse

Another day, another cupcake. This place was pretty awesome because the entire bakery/cafe is 100% gluten free! That's right. You heard me, EVERYTHING THERE IS 100% GLUTEN FREE! Looking at their goodies case I couldn't help myself and got a lemon coconut cupcake, and a chocolate strawberry frosting cupcake. I know, I'm crazy!

The lemon coconut was pretty good. The lemon cake was better without the frosting in my opinion, which makes it just a muffin, or a sad cupcake. The frosting was good, but the only coconut taste I had was from the decorative flakes on top. They should have pumped up the coconut flavor in the frosting, and if they had I would have been in love! Alas, they didn't ask my opinion.

The chocolate one was very disappointing. The cake was almost too chocolaty and a little bitter because of it. The frosting wins points because they had actual strawberry chunks in it, unlike the Sugar Circus strawberry cupcake. However, the frosting, even after sitting for a long time to warm up, never softened. It was like a big lump of hard...frosting. Sorry, I tried to come up with something clever and am blank. 

I am definitely going back! But for the cafe, and not the bakery. 

Grade: A- (lemon coconut), B (chocolate strawberry)

sugar circus

Today was stop #2 on my sweet treat quest! I was really excited heading there, because if I like it they have a different flavor every week. (only one flavor a week is GF/DF) This place was really far east, in a ghetto neighborhood. The outside of the shop is super cute, but looked really out of place between run down buildings. Walking in the loud metal music threw me off. I guess I was expecting circus music, and kids skipping around in a circle holding hands. 

When I got the cupcake the lady helping me, one of the owners/bakers, and I started talking about how hard it is to find good food that's both gluten and dairy free. She was super nice and even asked if I had a request for next week because she hadn't decided what she was going to make. How awesome?! A baker, who bakes (hopefully good) stuff I can eat, willing to make whatever flavor I want! I paid the $2.98 and merrily went on my way.

It was refrigerated so I had to wait awhile for it to get to room temp like she said I should. When I took it out of it's travel case, I immediately was surprised of the color. I've had (and made) strawberry cupcakes and they're usually bright pink with some strawberry chunks. This one had a few chunks, but the color was as if the cake had barely any strawberry in it. The icing was sweet, with a slightly strange after taste. Not bad, just...I couldn't place what it was. The cake tasted a little overcooked, and I couldn't taste any strawberry. Boo.

I'm willing to try again when they have a different flavor, and will buy at the beginning of the week when it's at its freshest instead of the last day of their baking week. Oh well. On to the next!

Grade: B+

summer quest

Angie decided this summer that she was going on a donut quest. She was going to find the best donut in Austin, and she has been recording her quest on Vine. (an app where you can make 6 second videos) I've been watching her videos everyday, and everyday am jealous I couldn't invite myself along. So I decided yesterday that I was going to go on my own summer quest. I started googling bakeries that have gluten free & dairy free cupcakes. Sadly, most places that do that make you order at least a half dozen cupcakes, instead of just 1. So, I changed the parameters to the best sweet treat I could find. I started a list of places to visit, and decided I would start with the Wheatsville Coop.

Although I have driven by it probably a hundred times (it's on the drag by campus), I had never actually gone inside. It's just like any small grocery store like Sprouts. I headed to their baked goods case to see what was available for me. There were brownies (boring), rice crispie treats (peanut butter inside? no thanks), and pumpkin chocolate chip whoopie pies (don't mind if I do). I mean come on, which would you choose?

Look at this delicious looking little morsel!

At $2 a pop, it's a pretty good deal for a gluten free, vegan treat, even if it is pretty small. I grabbed it and brought it home to eat. On my first initial bite, it was delicious and light! I ate a bite of just the cream and it was really good and not too sweet. The pie part was not overly sweet either in part, I'm guessing, to the pumpkin. Although I couldn't taste the pumpkin very much because of the chocolate chips and cream flavors taking over. It was really moist and not crumbly which was awesome! (Those of you that eat gluten free know that this can be a problem.) I don't eat sweets very much anymore because they're so hard to find for me with my crazy allergies, so it started to get a little too sweet for me at the end. 

Overall it was delicious! Next time I will just eat half and save the rest for later....if I can.

Grade: A