I love baked goods. I especially love cupcakes. So hearing such wonderful things about The Cupcake Shoppe's cupcakes I decided to go and take the plunge. The Cupcake Shoppe's cupcakes are decorated beautifully and the names that go along with them are cute however that's all that the cupcakes have going for them. I have never ever had such bland tasting cupcakes. The actual cupcake was crumbly but what really disgusted me was the frosting. I thought it was buttercream. And it may be advertised as buttercream but it tastes like oil. I am assuming they use shortening rather then real butter for their frosting (cheaper!) but lack in flavour. It left a residue on my tongue that I felt I had to scrape off. Not really worth it.

They seem to be all the rage these days, cupcakes. I see them at parties, weddings, as cupcake cakes and business gifts. Slews of specialty cupcake shops have opened up (at least here in Toronto!) to cater to this new trend.

Generally I am in favour of cupcakes. They’re the perfect combination of cake, candy and frosting for a person, and in a convenient size, too. They’re pretty and fairly easy to make, and even easier to eat!

Plus, they make great gifts!

I got some as a gift and here are my impressions:

Inside the box were two perfectly lovely cupcakes–with no smushing! Man, this bakery wasn’t messing around. They had the cakes sitting in a molded plastic holder made specifically for cupcakes which was then nestled on a non-slip liner. This was all tucked very snugly into the perfectly sized box. This combination protected my cuppi’s all the way home through the public transit system at rush hour, through the hectic grocery store and on the walk home!

So they looked great, but weren’t anything to write home about in the taste department. I find that with these fancy cupcakes, too much attention is spent on the decoration and not enough on the taste.

I found them to taste fairly stale and boring, really just void of flavour. They were dry and crumbly in the wrong way, and had a funny aftertaste. The icing was pretty gross, too. Extra points for not overloading the cupcakes with icing, but points deducted for lack of deliciousness. I understand that you have to increase the amount of preservatives or shelf-stable ingredients (such as shortening instead of real butter) in order to keep the cupcakes in good shape for longer-but I think there is still room for flavour.

I was kind of grossed-out after eating one of these, especially since I had had a really great cupcake from somewhere else earlier in the day to compare it to.

Overall I think that the concept of fancy cupcakes is a great one, but many of the cupcake shops just aren’t able to execute properly. If you’re supposed to specialize in something, then it should be fantastic. These were just disappointing, as were most other fancy cupcakes I have had.