A few years ago, someone turned me on to a little bakery specializing in cupcakes. Located in a little “mall” in the Gourmet Ghetto district of Berkeley, and now a short two block walk from my house, this place cranks out amazing mini cakes in all sorts of flavors, always perfectly moist, never stale, perfect frosting (usually buttercream).

A few days ago, I took my roomate (who, living two blocks away for a year, had never been) to Love At First Bite (yes, aptly named). I recommended my favorites and we headed home to have a cupcake before heading out to fly kites at the Berkeley Marina, and we planned to have another around dinner time. We bought Pretty in Pink, fresh strawberry; Red Velvet–50’s cocoa cake with cream cheese icing, and Peanut Butter Cup, a chocolate cupcake with peanut butter icing and a quarter reese’s on top.

Some of my other favorites include the Matcha (green tea), but I liked it better when it had the fluffy piped icing instead of the flat, denser icing, and at one point (though I haven’t seen it in a while) they had one called True Love which was different from another chocolate one in that it was like a moist, dense, milk chocolate with buttercream icing in vanilla or chocolate.

At any rate, this place is worth a trip, and though we can’t call it cheap (though for some perspective, the worst cupcake of my life was at the famed Citizen Cupcake in San Francisco, and cost almost 100% more than these), let’s admit it: cupcakes are a lot of work, and we just can’t make them like this at home. I use to come in from Oakland (though I’d come much farther with other excuses to be in the area) just jones’n for a cupcake, and you will too, once you’ve had one.