Holiday Cupcakes, Kara-style

A couple of weekends ago, I blogged about the holiday cupcake at Teacake Bake Shop on the East Bay (it was eggnog, in case you forgot). This past weekend, I was in San Francisco near the Marina District. So of course I had to check out Kara's Cupcakes.

For the holidays, they had a pumpkin spiced cupcake, of course. But they also had this cupcake called Peppermint Twist. It was a chocolate cupcake with peppermint candy crumbles on top. I bought one out of curiosity.

The chocolate cake itself was so richly satisfying. It had a dark color, almost like bittersweet chocolate, but still had a moist texture. But my first bite into the peppermint frosting made me feel like a light bulb went on above my head in some cartoon feature. It was like, who would have thought it would be like this?

I didn't imagine that the frosting would be so creamy and soft. It was like buddah (butter). I'm pretty sure it was a butter cream frosting. (Later on I learned on Kara's Web site that the frosting was white chocolate butter cream. Even better!) I had to take a picture below just so you can see the huge plop of butter cream that created this creamy, light goodness.

Of course, the first bite was amazing. But after the second bite, my tummy was thinking "I want my mommy." That's right, it's that sweet tasting flavor that you know you'll get a tummy ache if you ate too much of this or if you ate it on an empty stomach. Still, it was so different and yummy that I didn't care. I toughed it out.

So check out the Peppermint Twist at Kara's while they're still offering it. It's definitely something I've never had before. Ho ho ho.

Kara's Cupcakes, 3249 Scott St. (at Chestnut); second location at Ghiradelli Square. PH: 415.563.CAKE.