Last year's Valentine's Day collection from Kumquat Cupcakery. (Photo: Shani Bar-on)
Pop-ups come and go. But a handmade candy bar lasts—well, if not forever, at least until your willpower fails and you eat the sucker. Starting Thursday, the lovely ladies at Kumquat Cupcakery and Liddabit Sweets will be selling artisan treats out of a temporary storefront at Greenpoint’s Kill Devil Hill, whose owners are renting out the space to various artists, performers and vendors over the next two months. Sweet Shop will be open from 10am to 7pm daily from Thursday the 11th through Sunday the 14th, and both teams have whipped up festive Valentine’s Day treats—like Liddabit’s heart-shaped hibiscus and agave syrup lollipops ($1.75 each)—exclusively for the occasion.
Kumquat’s adorable cupcake roses ($24/dozen, $3 each) will be displayed alongside inventive Liddabit confections like My Spicy Valentine, a passion fruit–cayenne pepper caramel and crisped-rice candy bar ($6.50), “our take on the 100 Grand bar,” explains owner Liz Gutman. And if it’s chocolate you’re after, take note of its Chocolate Doom bar, which layers whipped white chocolate ganache and milk chocolate ganache over a cocoa sablé shortbread cookie.
Gutman and her partner, Jen King, both French Culinary Institute grads, started Liddabit last February as a “side project,” and after sharing stall space at the Brooklyn Flea, became friendly with Kumquat’s Keavy Landreth. It was the latter who originally booked the Kill Devil Hill space last month, but when she invited the candy-making duo to share it with her, they jumped at the chance.
Neither team owns a store of their own, nor have they ever participated in a pop-up, but they’re not about to let their lack of experience get in the way of having some fun. “My icing arm is going to get a really great workout,” explains a cheerful Landreth, who, like the Liddabit team, will be working overtime all week to prep for the Sweet Shop gig, in addition to special orders and a regular post at Brooklyn Flea.
“When you’re as small as we are,” says Gutman, “you have to say to yourself, ‘This is literally, physically, all we can make.’ But we’ve gotten much, much better. After ten months of doing this, we can turn out way more candy bars than we used to.” Stop in at the Thursday-night opening party for wine and get a head start on those V-Day provisions. If you’re lucky, maybe they’ll let you lick the bowl.—Alex Schechter
Related: Kumquat Cupcakery unveils their Valentine’s Day flavors
