Crumbs Joins The Cupcake Fray
By Nevin Martell
Metrocurean contributor
Another cupcakery has joined the fray. New York’s Crumbs Bake Shop opened their
first
store in the District this weekend at 604 11th St. NW. According to
co-founder Jason Bauer, it’s the first of 10 that will be popping up in
the area within the next year. The two other confirmed locations are
Clarendon and Union Station.
Crumbs' cupcakes come in four sizes — Taste (a big bite), Classic (your
standard cupcake), Signature (larger than average) and Colossal (it’s
basically a cake, so bring some friends). The shop also sells other
baked goods, such as whoopie pies and brownies, as well as coffee
drinks.
There are over 30 cupcake flavors available at any given
time, including seasonal options for Thanksgiving like Chocolate Pecan
Pie, Apple Cobbler and Pumpkin. Year-round regulars include the Good Guy
(a vanilla cupcake with a vanilla buttercream frosting center covered
in vanilla cream cheese frosting, sprinkles and drizzled with white
chocolate), Red Velvet (a red velvet cupcake with cream cheese frosting
and crumbled red velvet and white sprinkles), and Peanut Butter Cup (a
chocolate cupcake with peanut butter cream cheese frosting topped by
peanut butter cups and chocolate and peanut butter chips).
Christmas and Hanukkah flavors will be available starting in late November. Currently, there
are no flavors specific to DC, but co-founder Mia Bauer says she is
playing around with some concepts, including a cherry blossom cupcake
for the spring and another that’s more politically inspired.
Crumbs is now open, but their grand opening is this Friday, Nov. 19 at 7 a.m. The
first 1,000 people through the door that day get one free item of their choosing — and that includes Colossal cupcakes.
Nevin
Martell is a food writer, pop culture archeologist and travel junkie.
He is the author of the small press smash Looking for Calvin and Hobbes:
The Unconventional Story of Bill Watterson and His Revolutionary Comic
Strip (Continuum, 2009), Standing Small: A Celebration of 30 Years of
the LEGO Minifigure (DK, 2009), Dave Matthews Band: Music for the People
(Pocket, 2004), and Beck: The Art of Mutation (Pocket, 2001). He is a
contributing editor at Filter magazine and his work has appeared in
Paste, Giant, Men’s Health, Washington City Paper, Washington Post
Express, High Times, and Flaunt, as well as online at RollingStone.com
and Guardian.co.uk. Currently, he lives with his wife in Washington, DC,
where he writes full time. You can find him online at nevinmartell.com.