Cupcakes must somehow be in my stars.

To me, they have always been the most special of all possible treats. When I was growing up, my grandmother made great munchies for me all the time, but whenever my birthdays came around, she always out-did herself - with cupcakes.

One of the most scrumptious memories of my entire life goes back to my 6th birthday party, at my Nana's house, when she made what is to this day my all time favorite -- soft, moist chocolate chip cupcakes.

That's almost the only thing I remember about that day, other than my cousins and me dressing up as Cowboys, then running through the sprinklers on the lawn to cool off in the heat wave.

But I digress. Upon that first encounter with cupcakes, I quickly learned to fold the fluted paper case in half, and then to pull that half-round delight through my teeth, scraping the sticky chocolaty crumbs onto my tongue. Yum!

That was always my favorite part of the cupcake, because somehow the chocolate that stuck to the paper seemed richer and moister than the rest.

I remember running around collecting the paper wrappers the grownups were throwing away, because licking them off was an epiphany for me -- almost as good as licking the bowl!

Then a few years later, when I was away at summer camp, my Nana never failed me. Every Friday we homesick kids would gather by the flagpole for mail call, and sometimes there was a letter for me, and sometimes not. But sure enough, every Friday there would always be a little shoe box from my Nana, always neatly packed with chocolate chip cupcakes!

As I grew up, my appetite for cupcakes naturally evolved into a more sophisticated endeavor, eventually involving ice cream, whipped cream, sour cream, thickened cream, peanut butter, nuts, raisins, caramel and even mint, which I never liked by itself.

But over the years, my favorite has always remained the original classic Triple-C - the Chocolate Chip Cupcake.

I have now developed and refined my own chocolate chip cupcake recipe, with a chocolate ganache frosting, to become what I believe is the ultimate in cupcake potential. FYI, I also use this frosting with my choc orange cupcake recipe. Yum!

This accomplishment quite possibly represents the very pinnacle that our species can ever achieve, gastronomically speaking. So one could argue a strong case that human evolution, gastronomically speaking, has similarly reached its peak, and that we will simply plateau indefinitely into the future . . . unless my chocolate chip cupcake can somehow, somewhere, by someone, be surpassed.

But what kind of mind would it take to do that?! Another Einstein, or Hawking perhaps.

Having attained what I consider to be an elegant and definitive solution to the Chocolate Chip Cupcake, I now feel like a great scientist might feel, in the twilight of his years, as I look back over my life's work in cupcakes with a satisfying sense of completion.

So now, to avoid stagnation, I take on other challenges - that is, other cupcake recipes that don't involve chocolate. There is still plenty of room for innovative growth in this field!

For example, I am now dabbling with cream cheese-based recipes for cupcake icings. Some involve lemon, or other fruits, or nuts, gumdrops, candy or whatever strikes my whim. I refuse to discipline my inclinations, because I am an artist, and the cupcake is my medium. Besides, I find that my personal growth is now linked to my constantly evolving cupcake recipes.

To me, having conquered the Birthday Problem with the classic Triple-C, this cream-cheese phase seems like it could be the new frontier of the perennial Christmas Conundrum - ie, what to serve the kids? Imagine finding a solution to that two thousand year-old problem!

But the Christmas Conundrum inevitably involves the Decoration Dimension, so this is a wide open, challenging new field indeed for us Cupcake Innovators!

Meeting the challenge head on, I have started producing a cupcake which looks like something else entirely - like a frog, or a smiley face, an impish face, a star, a starfish, a baseball, a butterfly, angels, birds and flowers. It's fun! (As well as serious).

And I'm not the only one - I discovered an awful lot of like-minded souls out there!

For example, a little shop in the big city produces custom cupcakes to order, on any theme you could imagine. Their motto is "cupcakes are not just for kids any more!" And their product is definitely not aimed at people trying to lose weight! I guess the operative philosophy is, if you're going to indulge in a cupcake, then really indulge!

Well, maybe that shop has gone a little deeper into the Design Dimension than I have, but they haven't gone into the Taste Factor as deeply as I have - especially in the Chocolate Department.

As for the internet, you can find several high quality sites offering All Things Cupcake. For some really good recipes and design tips you can go to http://www.cupcake-creations.com.

It may interest you to know that the cupcake was invented in America in the early 19th century, about the time when the "cup" replaced the "ounce" as the standard unit of kitchen measurements.

However, the chocolate cupcake wasn't perfected until two centuries later, in 2007. That's when I produced the first Chocolate Chip Cupcake With Chocolate Ganache Frosting. (I hope that didn't sound immodest).

Some might say I'm tilting at windmills, by trying to solve eternal problems like the Christmas Conundrum. But I take inspiration from the memory of my Nana, and that gives me the strength and courage to be different (as if I ever had a choice). I may not go to church every Sunday, but I do maintain a strong faith that Cupcake Heaven is my destiny.

As I now sink deep into my luxurious chocolate-colored lounge, and chew thoughtfully on a chocolate cupcake wrapper, I can sense a major breakthrough on the horizon. The innovative mind cannot remain stagnant, nor daunted, for long!

Thus, whenever I feel like my life is getting stale, and I need to re-define myself, all I have to do is produce a successful new cupcake recipe, and voila - I'm a new person!