Cupcake Heaven

For a while, it seemed cupcakes became the trend in weddings. For my couples who have chosen to serve cupcakes over cake in the past year, it was not so much a trend, but just the desire to not be so predictable and to add more of a comfort food feel to such a personal day. One couple even topped off their cupcake tower with a giant cupcake they could cut into, as opposed to a small cake.


It seems the DC bakery market saw the trend and thus cupcakeries have popped up all over DC from Georgetown to Dupont to Chinatown. I happened to have a fabulous couple last year who did do the cupcake thing at their wedding, and their search for the best cupcake didn't stop there. Being the dessert lover I am, I decided to join in the search with them. Earlier this month we sat down with three cupcake bakeries products, four cupcakes from each, and not quite empty enough stomachs. Here's what we discovered:


Participants: Georgetown Cupcake, Baked and Wired, Red Velvet Cupcakery



Selection:
Georgetown Cupcake- Red Velvet, Coconut, Chocolate with Vanilla Icing, Chocolate3
Baked and Wired- Birthday Cake, Strawberry, Carrot, Banana
Red Velvet- Strawberry, Carrot, Cookies and Cream, Wake up Call



Focus Group- consisted of 2 very hungry men and 2 very eager women

Findings:

• Baked and Wired clearly had the largest cupcakes, wrapped in wax paper instead of regular cupcake cups. A great value for your sweet tooth.
• The old classics just didn't live up to our expectations. Did someone forget about chocolate and vanilla? They didn't stand out at all!
• Coconut cupcake reminded us too much of suntan lotion. We'd rather wear it than eat it!
• Baked and Wired's strawberry cupcake had great cake with real pieces of strawberry in it. The icing however was lacking in flavor.
• Red Velvet's strawberry cupcake cake was just ok, but the icing was great!
• This is a group who likes stuff in their cake. The carrot cupcake from baked and wired was great. Full of carrots, nuts and raisins. The icing however wasn't the real cream cheese icing a carrot cake needs.
• The carrot cupcake from Red Velvet was a bit of a let down, but the cream cheese icing was spot on!
• The red velvet cupcake from Georgetown Cupcake gets an honorable mention. Did you know real red velvet is not just vanilla cake with red food coloring?
• Cookies and cream and wake up call were just ok. It also could have been that we weer just too full to taste the goodness.

Conclusions:

We made two major decisions. 1) if the cake from Baked and Wired got together with the frosting from Red Velvet Cupcakery, they would have the perfect cupcake. 2) The banana cupcake from Baked and Wired was hands down the best cupcake we tried.



So, there you have it. There are many more bakeries who offer these decadent treats. Perhaps a taste test II will be necessary. I would love to hear some of your favorites so we can get a second group going. Here's to a yummy summer!!

Sara