The Cupcake Spot

I recently had the good fortune to escape the frozen North and travel to "The Sunshine City," St. Petersburg, Florida. Beyond the beautiful weather and lovely scenery, the trip also provided me with the opportunity to see new food with eyes! Exploring the downtown area, I was excited to see this fellow beckoning me to The Cupcake Spot:


The inviting storefront:


Of course, I couldn't just take pictures outside, so we went in and got some yummy chocolate cupcakes. The young lady who was working there explained that their mascot is named Cuppy. Here's a close-up of Cuppy:

And they had cute round business cards with Cuppy's image:

Back:

Be sure to check out The Cupcake Spot if you are in St. Petersburg or Tampa. If you can't visit in person, at least go to their website and click on "Watch Cuppy Dance" for a calorie-free treat!

Amazingly, Cuppy was not my only food with eyes encounter while in Florida. We took the train from Tampa to Ft. Lauderdale and to tide us over on the 4 hour trip we got some hamburgers from the dining car. Imagine my excitement to find that the handful of ketchup packets my husband grabbed for us contained this gem - an adorable French fry painting a Heinz ketchup bottle in front of the Eiffel Tower:

Of course, I couldn't part with the empty packet and painstakingly squeezed out every last drop and packed it carefully for the trip back home. Only when I looked at it carefully before scanning did I realize the artwork was created by an 11th grade student from New Jersey. It turns out that Heinz has been sponsoring an art contest for the last few years - the Heinz Ketchup Creativity Contest! Check out the Winners' Gallery to see other great designs, although I think this one is the best. Apparently the 2009 contest will be open for on-line voting in March. Prizes include $1000 and best of all, the design will be printed on 19.5 million ketchup packets!