Kara's Cupcakes, Palo Alto, CA

It seems like everybody has cupcake fever. Cupcakes, cupcakes, and more cupcakes. Most of the bakeries tout that they have the best cupcakes in the Bay Area. I'm a little wary. My favorite bakery began making fancy cupcakes about a year ago and they are AWFUL. Every thing else is lovely, but not the cupcakes. Plus they're EXPENSIVE. I digress.

Recently, a couple of well known cupcake purveyors opened up shop in Palo Alto. One of them is Kara's Cupcakes. It's pretty legendary in how good their cupcakes are and has 4 locations in the Bay Area. I was curious. I convinced Rick to take me (I was too lazy to drive myself :D) by telling him how wonderful the cupcakes are. Being a good husband, we packed up the Emi-chan and drove off to Kara's.

It's a cute little shop. Very pink. If I was a guy, I wouldn't be comfortable in this place unless I was with my girlfriend/wife/sister/mom/female friend. Except for these 2 guys...


The show case had rows and rows of cute, fluffy looking cupcakes. I chose 3 cupcakes: Sweet Vanilla, Sweet Chocolate, and Java.

L to R: Sweet Vanilla, Java
Bottom: Sweet Chocolate

After dinner, Rick and I taste tested 2 of the cupcakes. I had Sweet Vanilla and Rick had Java. I wasn't really thrilled with the Sweet Vanilla. It just tasted like...vanilla (duh). Kinda bland and frosting was a little too sweet. Rick liked the Java. The butter cream frosting had bits of coffee beans mixed in. However, he wasn't too thrilled when I told him how much each cupcake cost: $3.25 each. He said his cupcake didn't taste very good after I told him the price. I took a taste and really liked the frosting. It had oomph compared to the vanilla.

The next day, I ate the Sweet Chocolate (it was really for Emi-chan, but I was hungry). I really enjoyed this one. It was like eating a very luscious, expensive box of chocolate candy. The sweet frosting and the simple cake balanced each other out very well.

Overall, I liked Kara's Cupcakes and will visit, but only after I save up my quarters so I can afford to come back again.

Here for a moment...

...and gone in a flash!