Kansas City Food Blog

​There is always some new pastry on the block attempting to dethrone cupcakes. Now, The New York Times is certain that the next best hand-held dessert is nearly as old as the tiny cakes we've been enjoying since grade school. Ever had a whoopie pie?

The standard version is two round cakes, resembling hamburger buns, around a white icing that's typically vanilla. Whoopie pies share some flavor similarities with black-and-white cookies. The icing can be tooth-achingly sweet and the cake portion can be dry and crumbly.

While believed to have originated in the South, whoopie pies have become synonymous with two East Coast regions -- Pennyslvania Dutch Country and Maine. If you want tradition, Labadie's Bakery in Lewiston, Maine, has been making the pies since 1925. 
It's difficult to believe a product has arrived when Williams-Sonoma sells a dozen for $49 -- it's more like that idea has merely morphed into bacon, whose five-year run is close to running dry. Food historian Sandra Oliver gets it -- some food items don't deserve a luxury re-invention.

"It's like making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with almond butter. It's not meant to be fine cuisine," Oliver tells The New York Times.

Plus, there's only so many ways to slice a whoopie pie before it becomes something completely different. Cupcakes are versatile because the icing and cake are components designed to be changed. When you start to change the icing and cake flavors in whoopie pies, you end up with something that is not a whoopie pie -- it's closer to a cupcake sandwich on steriods.

Moreover, you don't go to Maine for the whoopie pies. You go for the lobster. Likewise, you're chowing down on pretzels in Pennsylvania Dutch Country. There's a reason whoopie pies haven't gone national. They are a perfect regional dessert, eaten as regularly as fried dough.

If you're determined to make your own -- here's a recipe. And when Trader Joe's theoretically arrives in Kansas City, the store will come stocked with whoopie pies.