Scary Weekend…

I grew up knowing that an earthquake could strike at any time, but we didn't really prepare for it. I think we got one earthquake kit once that expired and ended up being thrown away, never being touched (I should count my blessings!). I knew about doorways, staying away from windows, getting under large pieces of furniture etc etc.

The Northridge quake was in 1994. Up until then I hadn't felt anything bigger than a 4.something. Now that I look at that wikipedia page, that quake was only 10-20 seconds long and was a 6.7... nothing like what Japan experienced. But it did a lot of damage, nonetheless. And scary... boy, was it scary.

I've been on the east coast for 3 years. We've had warnings and watches and lighting and wind... lots of "extreme" weather, but nothing major. I've sort of adopted the locals' attitude regarding weather events... stock up on basics, ice and beer... lots of beer!

But this time... it was different. The local news mentioned that a big storm was coming our way on Saturday. This storm had left a wake of destruction in its path and there were lots of tornadoes but... err... Sunday... Sunday is going to be sunny and breezy and AWESOME! We can't wait for Sunday! End of story.

Our usual pre-storm visit to the grocery store was the least stressful pre-storm visit I'd ever had. The last time (can't even remember when that was!) I ran into our old neighbors at the Trader Joe's and we joked about the lines and how freaked out everyone was. Nothing happened that time. Or the time before, or the time before...

I was sensing a pattern here...

Saturday morning... woke up late, turned on the weather channel. Storms were heading our way.

My friend, new to North Carolina, texted me and said she was a bit scared. I told her it was nothing to worry about. We chatted on the phone, she hung up because the storm was getting really hairy and she has a 19 month old to take care of. She's 2 hours west of us. It passed her, and didn't really do anything but be ominous and loud. Phew... she's okay.

It's heading our way now...

The weather channel reported that a tornado touched down in Sanford, which is south and west of us. gulp. The friendly weather channel meteorologist, who kept boasting that he had studied under Ted Fujita, who came up with the Fujita scale for rating tornado intensity, said... "this doesn't look good... it looks like this tornado is going straight for downtown Raleigh". He looked scared... or at least a wee bit dismayed.

Panic.

Yes, it felt like a John Woo movie, find a few doves to release. Yes, deep down I knew we would be okay... but... this was new to me... and all I knew was that tornadoes generally move in a north-east direction, drop houses on bad witches and if it decided to skip up and say hello to us, we were really close. I sort of freaked out (it's in my nature) and started dragging photo albums into the basement.

Here's a map of the path of the tornadoes that came to visit yesterday. I took the liberty of marking where we live...

So, it all missed us. One of our neighbors sat on his deck all day and admired the storm with his two little dogs, some other neighbors ran errands and checked the tornado path on their phones, and just went about their day.

Meanwhile, I was hoarding bottles of water and clutching a blankie while flipping through news channels. Crank flashlight to the left of me, passports and birth certificates to the right (don't ask).

After all was said and done... we were all fine. Just really shaken up.

We decided to drive to the area around our old neighborhood, near Holly Springs, and check it out. We saw some debris, trees that had been snapped... minor damage... but then it got worse and worse. We decided not to drive into any of the subdivisions and be lookie-loos when everyone was so clearly trying to clean up.

Instead, we drove south to Sanford, to check out the Lowes Hardware that had been hit hard. We didn't know we what we were going to see along the way...

You see the pictures in the news... it doesn't do it justice. To be there... to see the damage... the sheer energy that this tornado exuded as it so easily snapped those large trees in the first few photos. It's a tremendous and humbling feeling to see that. It was really overwhelming.

Our pictures don't show even .1% of the damage we've seen on the news and online. You should see the aerial shots of the path of the tornado in Sanford (news link below).

The locals were busy cutting down trees and cleaning up. Mostly all smiles, which was surprising... and really cool.

If you'd like to read more, here's a link to our local news station (that went OFF the air in the middle of their broadcast because the tornado was heading straight for them! To turn to your trusty local news and see a blank, bright yellow screen... sort of eerie! Not like our dedicated NBC news crew in 1994(see below))

When all the storms were winding down, the meteorologist at the Weather Channel reminded us that... "well, Sunday is still going to be gorgeous and AWESOME while you are out there cleaning up the debris with your chainsaws and whatnot!". Yep.

Again, more respect for Mother Nature. We are so lucky. And our thoughts and prayers go out to those who didn't fare so well.

Here's a little Letterman to lighten the mood ;)

I love you Kent Shocknek.

Foodie Friday - Cupcake Field trip! :)

We recently went out to explore the cupcake possibilities in the area and we found The Cupcake Shoppe in Raleigh, and Gigi's Cupcakes in Raleigh.

Both were good, in their own way, but I'm still on the bandwagon that Sprinkles in LA is the one to beat (Yes, believe the hype).

Our first stop was The Cupcake Shoppe:

We got four cupcakes:
Black and White - Chocolate Cake with Vanilla Buttercream
Pretty In Pink - Fresh Strawberry Cake with Strawberry Buttercream
Peanut Butter Cup - Moist Chocolate Cake with Peanut Butter Buttercream
Banana Cream Pie - Banana Cake with Vanilla Buttercream Icing rolled in crushed up vanilla wafers

Then, while driving around, we stumbled upon a second cupcake shop, Gigi's. My husband was the one who spotted it, actually ;)

We got four cupcakes here, too:
Raspberry Champagne - Champagne-vanilla cake with Raspberry champagne icing
Wedding Cake - White cake topped with a vanilla buttercream frosting & sprinkled with white nonpareils
Scarlett's Velvet - Red velvet cake with a vanilla filling topped with cream cheese frosting, a white chocolate heart and red sugar crystals
White Midnight Magic - Dark chocolate cake with dark chocolate chips, topped with a white cream cheese frosting & chocolate chips

We drove straight home to conduct the cupcake review:

Raleigh Cupcake Shoppe:

Texture & Appearance: We found that overall, the cupcakes from the Raleigh Cupcake Shoppe were really dry. The cake was dry and the icing had that "crust" on it that let you know it had been exposed to air for too long. The banana cake, which is hard to do I realize, was exceptionally dry and more like a muffin. The one exception was the chocolate cake in the black and white. It was moist and tasted fresher than the others. They looked simple and elegant... nothing too big or dramatic about them. I was hoping the flavor would blow me out of the water to make up for that.

Taste: The cupcakes tasted pretty good, but a tad bland. The chocolate cake was excellent, the icing on this cake was not too sweet and you could tell there was real butter in there. I thought that overall, these had a light taste, nothing overwhelming or overpowering... but not too exciting, either. You could taste the flour, the understated use of sugar (not too sweet, which was a plus)... it tasted fresh-ish (minus the banana cupcake for sure), although you could tell these cupcakes had been exposed to too much air, making them drier than they should have been. I wonder if I got a fresh one if I'd be raving? :) If I get a fresh batch, I'll re-do my grading ;)

Atmosphere: It's a cute little shop that looks like it used to be an older building. You can peek around to the back and see their baking area. Parking is a nightmare, so maybe you want to drive with someone who can keep the car running, or get ready to walk.

In a nutshell: Taste homemade, with good ingredients... but not a lot of punch or pizazz. Cake is dry, icing is a little blah... but it still tasted pretty "natural" and "simple". If I could get a batch of fresh ones, I feel like I could really give them a proper rating.

Overall grade: C+

Gigi's Cupcakes:

Texture & Appearance: The texture on these were perfect. Soft, creamy icing, moist fresh and soft cake. The cupcakes were much larger than the cupcake shoppe. I loved the various toppings on the icing, too. Coarse sugar (gave a fun crunch), chocolate chips, little white sprinkles and the white-chocolate heart. All fabulous. These just looked impressive and creative when you walked in the door, like being in the Wonka Factory... it's cupcakes you've seen in other places, but on steroids.

Taste: SWEET! 2 of the 4 of these cupcakes were overly sweet. Be prepared. The icing was gorgeous, and if you are an icing fan you might be thrilled because there's more icing than cake, but the icing mostly tasted like whipped Betty Crocker tub frosting, minus that tub frosting after-taste :( (I'm so sad to say that). It just didn't taste "home made" or light and buttery. It was more crisco-like, but really whipped. The raspberry icing on the raspberry/champagne was the least like tub icing, although this one is not a regular menu item (and alas, it was my favorite). The cake tasted like box mix cake, but with a kick... like they added a few ingredients or sifted it nicely because the cake was perfect, texture-wise. The red velvet cake was even moister because of a gooey pudding blob in the middle... not bad, but... it wasn't adding anything to the flavor other than keeping that hard-to-keep-moist red velvet cake... moist. So... gosh... these are BETTER than grocery store cupcakes, taste just like "homemade" box/tub cupcakes, but they tasted just a bit better than the box/tub. But sweeter. And SO much prettier and you will impress your guests (as they scrape 80% of the icing off to the side of their plates).

Atmosphere: Strip mall. Lots of sun (blinding in the afternoons). Very simple cases and some logo retail items. The cupcakes are gorgeous and are the stars of the show. It's a franchise, they are well-organized with lots of fun colors, fliers and menus. Easy and ample parking.

In a nutshell: Gorgeous to look at, lots of great creative names and flavors, well thought out as a business, but dang it... these cupcakes have the sweetest icing I've ever encountered. Perfect texture, but the flavor is a bit over-the-top and unnatural. I still would be happy to serve them (with a warning) to my guests, though... especially because they would look great in pictures.

Overall grade: B

Other cupcake places I've tried... Sugarland (which I gave an A-) , Sprinkles (which I give an A+, although it's not indicated on my blog post, but you can see pictures!), Yummy Cupcakes (I didn't blog about it, but they were pretty awful... SO dry, maybe I went too late in the middle of the week? C-) .

Again, Sprinkles is by far, the best... fresh, pretty and taste great! :)

Wouldn't it be fun to travel the world and rate cupcakes? ;)

We're going to NYC in May... might have to check out a few places and report back!