How Sweet It Is: Cupcakes for Obama

Zilly Rosen of Zillycakes in Buffalo, New York created this portrait of Barack Obama using 1,240 cupcakes. The blog Cupcakes Take the Cake recently posted an interview with the artist/baker. Here's a snippet:

"I began to think of cake, frosting, fondant, and gum paste as art mediums just like paint, clay, metal, and glass. There are many, many similarities in how you an create with them. The wonderful difference is that cake is more easily accessible to people both as an art and as a commodity. It is nearly always associated with a celebration. It is both ephemeral and enduring; the cake is all about the 'now,' but the remaining visual image and emotional effect exist and even grow in people’s memory."

In sight of Rosen's work, I'm reminded that America has a so-called cupcake problem—a ban almost as outrageous as California's Proposition 8. While cupcake debates were sparked by attempts to encourage healthier eating among children and rid schools of junk food (a good thing, of course), it seems the focus should be the ingredients and frequency of mom's little treats for the school yard rather than the very thought of them. And from what I remember of K-12, vending machines filled with Dr. Pepper and partially-hydrogenated goodies were more readily available than cupcakes.

Sure, child (and adult) obesity and diabetes is a problem, but sugar doesn't have to be a dirty word. Valerie Latona, editor in chief of Self, says it best in the magazine's current issue: "There's no reason not to indulge in something you enjoy, provided you don't feel guilty about eating it, and you do it in moderation."

That said, if you plan to attend Obama's inauguration on January 20, 2009 and don't have the patience to emulate Rosen's baked homage, pick up the Chocolate Ganache at Georgetown Cupcake. This sweet spot was voted D.C.'s best in the Washington Post series "The Cupcake Wars." The winning team speaks here.