Let them eat cake

Oh, how rough life is! Tastings for the wedding continues and up: cakes. We've decided on an appetizer reception for the food, but what's the sweet end note for our special day? I invited some friends and the fiance and let them eat cake in the name of discovering the perfect wedding cake.

Wedding Cake Tasting part II: Whole Foods and Seward Coop

Our first tasting was with Megan from Groundswell which is about as local as we can get unless we bake the cake ourselves. Despite only sampling one of her vegan cupcakes, chocolate sriracha, before, I loved the care she took to take a special cupcake and give it a little more to make it unique...like adding sriracha to chocolate. We contacted her and she was super friendly and took our suggestions and added to them to make four options to consider.

Crowd favorite: Champagne cake with cranberry compote filling and white frosting

Nothing says Fall, like pumpkin cupcakes with orange and almond frosting

The weather isn't yet frightful, but this spiced cupcake is oh so delightful

Mixed reaction to the espresso cupcakes with a dense chocolate ganache 

We also tried four options from Seward Coop, and they were tasty but not quite as special as the Groundswell cupcakes. They do have quite a few flavor combinations, and we tried chocolate mousse, chocolate peanut butter, vanilla with chocolate frosting and carrot cake with maple frosting.

Moist carrot cake with mapled frosting screams Fall!

In a "take it up a notch" move, I also picked up a slice of Chicago Diner's chocolate mousse cake available by slice or round cake at Whole Foods. It was extremely decadent, and as the fiance said "let's be real, this is frosting with a touch of cake." My mom would have loved it, but it was probably a bit much for a crisp Fall afternoon.

Chocolate Overload!

Not pictured, we also tried the Wedge Coop's cupcakes earlier this summer. They've got fun flavors like black forest cherry and curry (yes, with actual curry flavoring.) While I'm in love with their coconut based softserve ice cream, I have to say the cupcakes fell short. They had the consistency of a store bought/hostess brand cake. Their cupcakes were almost half the cost of the other cupcakes we tried.

In the end, we've decided on Groundswell and look forward to it and the big day!