Valentine’s Day gift giving can get complicated. There as so many choices: flowers, cupcakes, adorable stuffed animals, a massage at the spa…mmmm, massage at the spa… So which one should you get your sweetie? Ok, after you make sure to get that massage for your significant other (and one for you, too!), I recommend making your life easier by getting two gifts in one: a cupcake bouquet.

Two cupcakeries with notable bouquet showings are Bettie’s Cakes of Saratoga Springs, New York and The Blushing Bakery of Charlotte, North Carolina.  The Blushing Bakery chooses to go with five pink (fitting!) frosting cupcakes arranged in a bucket.  Bettie’s Cakes does a classic dozen red roses in a long florist’s box.  Either way, that’s some fancy frosting work. Too good to eat? Never!

We’ve covered cupcake bath bombs before, but since bath fizzies are SO GREAT (and rather seasonally appropriate), I think it’s high time we wrote about them again.

My neighborhood bath goodies store, Bliss Soaps, carries chocolate, vanilla and strawberry cupcake bath fizzies with bubble bath frosting (cupcake fizzie lovers who live outside Seattle, never fear – follow the link to order online). I really like Bliss because all their products are hand-made from all-natural, high quality ingredients. Maybe not good quite enough to eat, but certainly much better for you and your skin than the run of the mill mass-produced bath product.  Also, how can you feel bad supporting a small business in times like these?

Valentine’s Day is a holiday for lovers. So what the heck are you supposed to if you’re single?  Cakelab of NYC has a solution: their Sourpuss Cupcake Pack. Instead of the usual romantic sentiments, the Sourpuss pack features conversation dot cupcakes with messages like “H8 You”, “Let it go”, and “WTF”.  You can also drown your sorrows in the accompanying Sourpuss pack flavors of banana split, chocolate chip cookie dough and black bottom.

Cakelab is not one to drive off customers – they’ve got a Sweetheart pack too, for those who have them :) This assortment comes with more conventionally messaged champagne-flavored conversation dots as well as red velvet, chocolate turtle, and chocolate covered strawberry cupcakes.

I really appreciate Cakelab’s approach to cupcakes for the upcoming heart-shaped holiday. They’re willing to be typically adorable and inventively bitter, thus capturing both sides of the Valentine’s Day market.

You’ve seen it here at All Things Cupcake, you’ve seen it everywhere:  the  pink and red and heart-shaped wave has come and it’s sweeping up our favorite little confection in its wake.  Red Velvet cupcakes are enjoying a seasonal bump in popularity (no surprise there) as cupcakeries across the nation make a run on flavors in the right color range. Ex-pat bakery Little Miss Cupcake is taking the trend to Paris with their special Valentine’s flavors La Vie En Rose, Linger, & Go All The Way.  In my own hometown, Cupcake Royale just came out with this year’s version of the Deathcake Royale,  a chocolate-packed supercake that’s only available for two weeks per annum right before Valentine’s Day.

This is just a proverbial taste of what is to come.  All Things Cupcake is here to bring you daily coverage on the latest in Valentine’s Day themed-cupcakes (and cupcake shaped items!).

I stand amazed. These cupcakes are little cartoon-y works of art. Works of art that get special points for the cool Futurama reference and the fact that they are delicious (at least, that’s what their creator Alicia Policia claims, and far be it from me to gainsay the words of such an artiste).

Ingredients used: homemade vanilla cupcake base (made from scratch), buttercream icing brains with a touch of grenadine, and gum paste slugs with royal icing eyes and flower stamen attenae. Neat!

Red Velvet is officially the cupcake flavor of the hour.  It’s been mentioned everywhere this week, including right here on All Things Cupcake. Personally, I suspect it has something to do with a certain romantic holiday on the horizon, a suspicion that is upheld by a recent Google image search that shows almost every red velvet cupcake accompanied by little heart decorations. But I should give credit where credit is due: the deliciousness of vanilla cake with a kiss of cocoa and topped with buttercream plus the dramatic presentation of red cake and white frosting makes red velvet cake (and cupcake!) a classic.

The task that Food2 (the Food Network’s sassy younger sibling) puts to challengers is deceptively simple: take pictures of cupcakes, submit them at the Food2 website, and may the best photo win.  Multiple entries are allowed, and the cupcake or cupcakes don’t have to be yours (but the photos do, of course).  Food2 started taking submissions for the Cupcake Cup yesterday and the will continue taking them for the next 40 days.  Photos have already started to come in if you’d like to take a look at the competition, or vote for them for that matter.

And what will you win?  A silicone bakeware Giant Cupcake Baking Set… and the eternal glory of being the first person to win the Cupcake Cup.

I think cupcakes are pretty great. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t be writing for All Things Cupcake, right?  But it takes something special for me to bestow an “OMFGBBQ CUTECAKES!” award.  CakeSpy has it…CakeSpy, in fact, takes the cutecake.

I first discovered CakeSpy a few years ago at I Heart Rummage, a local artist swapmeet that goes on every other month at Chop Suey (Capitol Hill, Seattle).  I stood at the booth for at least five minutes paralyzed and making cute noises over freakin’ adorable drawings of wee little cupcakes living their little cupcake lives: checking the interwebs at a coffeeshop, falling in love, and running from zombies.  It made my week.

Turns out that CakeSpy (aka artist and writer Jessie Oleson) not only does prints of the wee lives of cupcakes, she also have a blog and plenty more merch. I mean really – what says awesome like a hip cupcakes and unicorns tee in the closet, a cupcakes and unicorn checkbook in your purse and teeny-beeny cupcake and unicorn magnets on the fridge?

As I was walking past some storefronts this afternoon, I noticed something I had never seen before: a cupcake calendar.  My boyfriend confirmed that while this was the first year he had seen it too, the Hello, Cupcake! calendar is in stores all over town. It’s sort of a companion to the Hello, Cupcake (Irresistably Playful Creations Anyone Can Make) book, being as it’s made by the same folks out of their favorite illustrations from the book.  From the pictures on their website (the little doggiecakes are the on front cover of the calendar), it looks like a darn cute way of keeping track of the days as well as a serving as a muse for the creative in the kitchen.

In my search for quality cupcake news, I’m keep seeing one word: trendy.  As with every trend, two questions come to mind:”When will the bubble burst?” and “Is all this hoopla a good thing?”

Though cupcakes have moved past the “indy cool” stage, the trend is only just going mainstream and cupcakeries are still popping up all across the country.  You’d think this would be a bonanza for cupcake fans, but in reality it’s a mixed bag.

At All Things Cupcake you can see the best side of this trend: great recipes, lots of creative ideas, and many entrepreneurs making a go of it, even in a poor economy. However, both Carmelized OpiNIONS and Kat with a K have posts this week about the downside of the cupcake bubble: overpriced product, inferior quality, and the annoying fact that cupcake have been co-opted for the purposes of conspicuous consumption.

The good thing is that all trends pass. The bursting of the cupcake bubble , whenever it happens, will have the effect of winnowing out cupcakeries- while many will go out of business, those with the best recipes and sound business plans will survive.   In the meantime, I hope that talented bakers everywhere will use this opportunity to raise some capital and that cupcake hobbyists will have a lot of fun reading all the press.

Love My Cake of Upper Montclair, NJ starts with all the necessary ingredients for a good cupcake establishment: family recipes, rich and delicious ingredients, and of course, a deep and lasting love of cupcakes.  Love My Cake also has what it takes to go from good to local icon status: panache.  Owner Sonya Newton has a flair not only for baking, but also for the creation of chic, and it shows in Love My Cake’s fashionably boutique design, stylish cupcakes and vintage apron collection.

Speaking of chic and unique – one of Love My Cake’s specialities is their Cupcake In A Jar. I’ve heard of mason jar crumbles before, and even mason jar pies, but this is the first time I’ve heard of a cupcake in a mason jar.  It sounds like we’ve discovered the latest fashion in baked goods –  are cookies next?

Cupcakes are versatile things. They’re tasty, portable, come in many flavors, have been known to create jobs, and also happen to be really good for fundraising.  Emma Klassen of Kelowna, BC made the right choice when she decided to make 300 gourmet cupcakes to exchange for donations to the Canadian Foundation for the Children of Haiti.

Klassen put together this Saturday’s Sweet Exchange to collect money and supplies for the Haiti Home for Children, an orphanage and school run by the CFCH. Though the orphanage’s buildings have been damaged, the children and caretakers were not hurt in the earthquake and are presently living in the orphanage’s courtyard.

While the Sweet Exchange is over,  the Haiti Home for Children still needs your help. You can send donations to the CFCH at:

The Canadian Foundation for the Children of Haiti
11400 Seafield Crescent
Richmond, B.C. Canada. V7A 3J2

(CFCH is a registered Canadian charity. CRA Business No. 89000 4591 RR0001. Donations qualify for CIDA’s matching grant program.  Tax receipts will be issued for donations over $20)

As the recession stretches on and jobs stay hard to find, more people are turning to self-employment to pay the bills.   The name of the game is to use your pre-existing skills in a venture with a low start-up cost.  Like, say, using your many years of cupcake-baking experience to start a business selling cupcakes.

Carrie Spindler of Hudson County, New Jersey did just that when she started GoodieBox Bakeshop.  After losing her job, Spindler decided to take the leap and put her fifteen years of baking experience to entrepreneurial use. Spindler started her business online and created a dedicated following (especially for her signature red velvet cupcakes) before moving into her own retail space.

Mini Empire Bakery of Seattle, Washington has much the same business plan. Christy Beaver and Morgan Greenseth started their cupcakes and more concern online this last December and have just started selling their goods in local cafes as well.  Just as Spindler did with GoodieBox, Beaver and Greenseth plan on building a following before setting up a brick and mortar shop.

Besides the relative ease and low-cost of starting up an online catering company, these cupcake entrepreneurs have one more thing on their side: the robustness of the small luxuries market. While many of us can no longer afford big luxuries,  we still have money for little luxuries like cupcakes. Thus cupcake-making is a potential source of jobs as well as sweetness, even in tough economic times like these.

One simply cannot speak of vegan cupcakes without a solid reference to The Urban Housewife. Known as Melisser to her nearest and dearest, The Urban Housewife has been changing the way we think of vegan baked goods since 2007. With each post to her Veg Bloggy Award-winning site, thousands of fans tune in to see where she’s been and what she ate. From Berlin to New York to Stockholm, she’s been everywhere, eaten every vegan thing and lived to blog about it.

I asked Melisser to give our readers a sampling of some of her tastiest vegan cupcake adventures and she put together a list of 10 fab places to snag a vegan cupcake. The list, she stresses, is in no particular order.

Oh, and she was too humble to mention it, but one place you’re sure to find a delicious vegan treat is Melisser’s own commercial kitchen- Sugar Beat Sweets. If you’re in the San Francisco area be sure to hit her up for some Snickerdoodle cupcakes!

Ten places you might just spot Melisser eating vegan cupcakes:

1. Vegan Treats, Bethlehem, PA & throughout the East Coast
Known throughout the vegan land for their Peanut Butter Bombs, Vegan Treats also serves up a selection of other fine pastries. After years of wholesale throughout the East Coast, owner Danielle Konya opened a retail store where you can get your cupcake on.

Cupcakes are the heart of this shop where you’ll find everything from Fleur de Sel Caramel cupcakes to Bacon Maple Walnut cupcakes, all vegan of course!

The Bleeding Heart Bakery, Chicago

3. The Bleeding Heart Bakery, Chicago, IL

While not everything in the packed pastry cases is vegan, a hearty selection of cupcakes await you at this all organic, 100% punk rock bakery!

Whether you’re looking for a cosy place to chill, a delicious sandwich, or a sweet treat, S’nice delivers with their cupcake, baked in house & available daily.

Not your traditional cupcake, Babycakes spelt or gluten free cupcakes caters to those with allergies or looking for a wholesome cupcake.

Sticky Fingers may be better known for their massive cinnamon rolls, but the cupcake selection won’t disappoint at this bakery churning out a full selection of cruelty free confections!

Cupcake, Berlin, Germany

8. Pattycake Bakery, Columbus, OH
Pattycake started out making cookies for a local co-op, but now has a full selection of vegan treats, including cupcakes, that you can snag from their storefront or the upcoming online ordering system!

9. Watercourse Bakery, Denver, CO
Not only Ho Ho Cupcakes should tempt you to try this all vegan bakery, as a full selection of sweets are available. For those with allergies, they specialize in gluten free options.

The food may not blow you away at this vegan eatery with a LA hippie vibe, but the desserts are no crunchy granola & their decadence will definitely satisfy your sweet tooth!

How completely sweet is this tiny Polaroid necklace from Etsy seller Phoebe Marie?

There are loads of cupcake-themed necklaces in the shop, but these wee photos are my favorite!

And at only $5 a pop, why not try a few flavors?

Oh how much I love this frilly-yet-badass apron from LivingThread! So much so that, if it had a full back or I had a less-full backside, I would totally wear it as a dress this summer.

To be honest, I was going to post about an adorable half-apron she added to her shop yesterday, but it looks as though it was so adorable someone else already snatched it up!

Don’t let it happen to you! Run, don’t walk to Etsy and make this hot little number yours for a mere $35! Why not pick up a snarky dish towel or an ice cream cone pin cushion while you’re there?

I got a text message from CM Punk last Tuesday letting me know that not only did he get a cupcake tattoo that afternoon, but he also declares 2009 “Year of the Cupcake.” The first tattoo photo (taken with his Sidekick) was pretty bad so last night I asked him for a new one. This one’s better, believe it or not, and he said Shawn Michaels took it, which makes it even more awesome.

You may recall the Sugar Slam bake off I hosted a few months ago- Punk picked a Pepsi cupcake as the winner not only because it was named after him, but also because it wasn’t really frosted. What kind of frosting hater gets a cupcake tattoo?

2009: Year of the Cupcake according to CM Punk, you heard it here first.