Tiffany Tastes

Congrats to a Rising Star

We want to give a huge congratulations to Chef Kelly English of Restaurant Iris in Memphis TN for his selection as a regional semi-finalist in this year's James Beard Foundation awards.  A list of finalists will be made public on March 22 and the winners will be announced on May 3.  This comes after he was named Best New Chef by Food and Wine Magazine in 2009

It's a Dirty Job...Part 2

In my previous post, I compared the red velvet cupcakes at Muddy's Bake Shop and Gigi's Cupcakes with Muddy's being the slight favorite.  In this edition of "It's a Dirty Job" the hubby and I take on Muddy's and Gigi's chocolate cupcake with chocolate frosting, named the Prozac and Texas Milk Chocolate respectively.

As with the red velvet competition, Gigi's (left)  clearly dominates Muddy's (right) in the size department.  Twice the size and twice the price.  Gigi's cupcake are also more decorative with the chocolate sprinkles and the fondant heart. 

The color of the cake and frosting in this case are much closer than with the red velvet versions. 
While both cupcakes had some positives, there was a clear winner.

Muddy's: The Prozac wins on flavor of cake and frosting.  It was sweet and rich, but not overly so; 3 delicious chocolatey bites.  The Prozac also wins on the texture of the cake; moist, light and fluffy.  Where Muddy's chocolate on chocolate version lost a couple of points was on the texture of the frosting.  It was a little too soft, almost as if it was melting.  Otherwise, it was perfect.

Gigi's: The only way that this cupcake was superior was the texture of the frosting.  Everything else was subpar.  The frosting wasn't as rich or as chocolatey as its Muddy's counterpart.  The cake was dry (I honestly think that the size of Gigi's cupcakes prevents them from being as moist or as light as the smaller Muddy's versions. It's possible that they dry out because it takes some much longer for them to bake through).  Another issue was the flavor of the cupcake.  Instead of biting in to rich, chocolate bliss, the Texas Milk Chocolate cupcake has the strange addition of cinnamon added to the cake batter.  For a cupcake that is described as "milk chocolate cake topped with milk chocolate frosting," the presence of the cinnamon was quite jarring.  I found the description to be a bit deceiving. After a while, I didn't mind the cinnamon so much, but the hubby didn't care for it at all.  And, again, it seemed like there was just way too much frosting for the amount of cupcake.

The winner of this round and of our competition overall is Muddy's Bake Shop. Even though the cupcakes are smaller, Muddy's wins on the taste and texture of their cake.  It's true that Gigi's gives you more, but more doesn't always mean better.

It's a Dirty Job...

Oh the sacrifices I make for you, my faithful followers. A few months ago, I did a post about Muddy's Bake Shop, a bakery in East Memphis that offers assorted treats such as puddings, pies, cookies and most importantly...cupcakes.  For a while, this was the only shop of its kind in East Memphis.  A few weeks ago, a little competition came to town in the form of Gigi's Cupcakes, a shop that is a part of a small specialty chain that sells, wait for it, cupcakes.  So, I've decided that it is my supreme responsibility to sample cupcakes from both establishments to give you my official opinion about where to buy the best cupcakes in town.  I enlisted my husband to help me (and share the calories).  So we stopped in each of the shops on a busy Saturday afternoon, grabbed some milk, and got to it.

We decided to try two different kinds of cupcakes in order to get a sufficient sample size.  I selected the red velvet cupcake and the hubby wanted to sample chocolate cupcakes with chocolate frosting. 

Gigi's red velvet offering is called Scarlett's Velvet and Muddy's named theirs Frankly Scarlett.

Gigi's version is on the left and Muddy's is on the right.   Gigi's rendition has more decoration, while Muddy's took a simpler route.  As you can see, Gigi's is much larger than Muddy's but at twice the price ($3.00 for a Gigi's cupcake and $1.50 for a Muddy's cupcake) there needs to be something to justify the large price tag.

Just based on appearance, in addition to the obvious size difference, the Muddy's version is way more red; the Gigi's version is darker.  Gigi's cupcakes also have a crap-load more cream cheese frosting.  There's almost more frosting than cake.  Gigi's utilizes a vanilla cream in the center of their red velvet cupcake.

As far as taste goes: I found the flavor and texture of Muddy's cupcake to be far superior to that of Gigi's cupcake.  The Gigi's version seemed a little dry, even with the cream filling.  I found the inclusion of the cream filling to be a little odd, especially since it added absolutely zero flavor to the cupcake overall.  It made the inside of the cupcake just seem weirdly damp. However, I preferred the flavor of the frosting on Gigi's red velvet cupcake than that of Muddy's.  It was a little creamier, a little sweeter, and the crunchy sugar crystals on top offered a nice textural contrast.  But, there is way, way, way too much frosting on Gigi's cupcake.  More is not always better.

Tom, on the other hand, really enjoyed the cream filling in Gigi's cupcake. He said that it reminded him of a cream-filled doughnut, and felt that Gigi's cake was better overall, but he preferred the flavor of Muddy's frosting.

For me, Round One goes to Muddy's (by a slim margin).  Stay tuned for the results of Round Two (chocolate on chocolate) in my next post.

A Taste of Something Different

I have a new job in the Midtown area of Memphis, so I'm trying new places that are a bit of a trek from my East Memphis residence.  A few days ago, I met some friends for lunch at Cafe Eclectic, a hip eatery near Rhodes College.

We sat down at 1:00pm, but the place was still plenty crowded.  (That could be attributed to the free WiFi, since most of the patrons were sipping coffee and working on laptops).  A waiter came over promptly to take our drink orders.  I went for a Mexican Coke (which, if you're not familiar, is made with sugar instead of corn syrup and only comes in glass bottles).  For my entrée I had the chicken pot pie, which my server told me would be the best restaurant version I would ever eat.  While, I think he may have been stretching it just a tad, it was still pretty good, and the crust was very flaky.  I chose a side salad for my accompaniment, and it was decent, nothing special.  My dining companions A and J ordered the chicken pot pie and the BLT&A with side salads respectively. A agreed that the pot pie and salad were decent, nice and filling especially on a cold day, but he'd had better.  J really enjoyed his BLT&A (a bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich with avocado). The bacon was crispy, the avocado ripe, and the whole sandwich tasted fresh and delicious.

For dessert, the three of us split the Charlie Brown Bar and the bread pudding.  The Charlie Brown Bar is a super rich peanut butter and oatmeal cookie with chocolate chips and a more peanut butter on top.  It was extremely dense, and while I liked the flavor, the texture was a little off-putting.  The bread pudding, however, is top notch.  It's made from croissants, full of raisins, and covered in a rich butter sauce.  I LOVE bread pudding, but that being said, I'm also quite picky about them, so trust me, you can't go wrong with Cafe Eclectic's superb version.

Final Impressions: Cafe Eclectic is a cool place to hang out with your laptop and a cup of java, or to grab a bite to eat during the work day.  The bakery case has several treats to choose from, and they even have ice cream and an old-fashioned soda fountain.

Tiffany's Favorite Part: two words- Bread Pudding

Tiffany's Rating: :) :) :) out of :) :) :) :)

Cafe Eclectic
603 N. McClean Boulevard
Memphis, TN 38107
(901) 725-1718

Average Breakfast Price: $4-$10
Average Soup/Salad Price: $4-$7
Average Sandwich Price: $7-$9
Average Entrée Price: $7-$9
Average Dessert Price: $2-$6

Operating Hours
Monday-Wednesday 7:00am-10:00pm
Thursday-Saturday 7:00am-1:00am
Sunday 9:00am-10:00pm