Too pretty to eat?
February 14, 2012
5:15 p.m. It’s Valentine’s Day. There are two strawberry champagne cupcakes from Persephone Bakery sitting on the coffee table just inside my door. The cupcake fairy left them along with some Persephone hot chocolate mix, Persephone vanilla marshmallows and Persephone French macaroons. Did I mention that I love the cupcake fairy?
There’s a terribly cute and funny guy coming over to cook us some sort of yummy dinner. He won’t be here for nearly two hours though and I’m starving after an afternoon of skiing. If I eat both cupcakes before he gets here and hide the cute bags each is packaged in, am I the worst girlfriend in the world?
5:30 p.m. The cupcakes are staring at me. Daring me to eat them. Damn cupcakes. I’ll have a couple of shots of espresso instead. Coffee is an appetite suppressant, right?
5:36 p.m. Espresso gone. Appetite (for cupcakes) remains.
5:40 p.m. I remove the cupcakes from the center of my kitchen table. I walk them downstairs to the gear room in the basement. It’s like a black hole down there. Out of sight, out of mind?
5:42 p.m. Out of sight, not out of mind.
5:45 p.m. I’ll take a bath. That’ll take my mind off them. And I’m kinda stinky after a day of skiing anyway.
6:38 p.m. Ahhhh. Only 22 minutes to go.
6:45 p.m. 15 minutes to go. I wonder what the cute cook is going to chef up? Whoa! I’m thinking about food other than cupcakes. Yeah for me!
6:47 p.m. I’ll call my dad to wish him a happy Valentine’s Day.
7:02 p.m. The cook arrives.
7:10 p.m. It’ll be Tikka Masala for dinner. Now I’m glad I didn’t ruin my appetite.
9:20 p.m. Dinner is over. No longer famished, I can now appreciate the beauty of the cupcakes. They’re works of art. I bet the tiny white rose atop each one is edible too.
9:27 p.m. After all this I can’t bring myself to eat such a work of art. We polish off the macaroons instead. In San Francisco last week, I did a bit of a macaroon tour, sampling the macaroons at four bakeries within walking distance of my brother’s home in Cole Valley. I had had a chocolate peanut butter one that I thought might be the best macaroon ever. I was wrong. Persephone’s totally has that one beat. Soft with a bit of spring and full of delicate almond flavor.
