Criteria

Before I upload my first cupcake review (I know, it's taken a while, I apologise) I would like to set out how I will be reviewing different aspects of the cupcake. (Oh yeah, this is serious stuff my friends!)

I would like to point out that these reviews are in no way meant to offend, they are purely my opinions and the purpose of this blog is to share these opinions with you because I love cake and I love talking about cake almost as much as I love eating it. If you have any suggestions of cakes or suggestions for improvements let me know, I'm more than open to change :)

I will give every criteria a mark out of five and then an overall score, I would have done it with stars but I couldn't work out how without just using ***** which just looks like I've edited out obscene language. so 1-2-3-4-5/ 5 it is.

Presentation:

We all love to look at a cupcake and think "Wow! Half of me wants to keep that in a glass cabinet and look at it all day, it will be my pride and joy, but the other half wants to eat that tasty concoction of eggs, sugar, flour, and butter!" this is what we're looking for in the presentation, something unusual, something interesting, but ultimately something that looks tasty.

Frosting:

Here is where we dissect the humble cupcake and look at it's components separately. The frosting is important as it is this that defines it as a cupcake, not a muffin, or a roll, or a bun but a cupcake. Taste and texture are what's important as well as balance with the sponge. For example is the layer of frosting too thick or too thin? This is the sort of thing I'll be looking at.

Cake :

Sponge is - I believe - more important than frosting and is by far the most difficult to get right. I've only tried one cupcake where I've really felt they paid attention to the sponge and I've tried far too many that didn't. I'll again be talking about taste and texture as well as originality; if it's just a plain sponge or if it has chocolate drops in it, peach slices, bit's of strawberry, nuts, rainbows, all that fun stuff will be talked about under the "cake" section.

Overall:

This will be my personal impression of the cake and the overall quality and memorability of the cake.

The moral of the story...

If I feel that there are lessons to be learnt from the cake, eg. an ingenious way to pipe the frosting or a disastrous combination of flavours (like bacon and vanilla - I'm not saying it wouldn't work, but I'd rather not find out) this will be the place to talk about such things.

I hope you enjoy!

S xxx

Greggs

Hello Lovelies!!!

So it's taken me a while to post this, firstly because I didn't have a picture of the cupcake and so I needed to buy a new one to show you what it looked like as presentation is very important with these cakes, and secondly because once I had taken the photo my computer was very annoying and wouldn't upload it from my phone. So it's taken me me a while but here it is.

Presentation: 4/5 (pretty good)

The presentation for this cupcake was pretty good, the dollop of molten chocolate was a nice touch and something I hadn't seen before, along with the white chocolate curls and the swirled frosting, it wasn't anything special but it does look yummy.

Frosting: 3/5 (around about average)

The frosting was nice, very light and mousse-y, and the taste was helped massively by the aforementioned molten chocolate as otherwise I think it would have tasted quite bland. The layer of frosting was pretty thick but it wasn't overpowering as it was a light consistency.

Cake: 2/5 ( disappointing/poor)

This is where the cake as a whole was seriously let down. Being a bakery I expected Greggs to produce a fairly good sponge but I was disappointed. It was dry and dull, but by far the weirdest thing was that it actually felt like a sponge, I reckon my mum could have used it to mop up the kitchen counter. I know you want sponge to be springy but there's a line that shouldn't be crossed. The dryness may have come from the fact that it was nearing the end of the day, but this isn't really a good enough excuse. The only thing that redeemed it was that the taste wasn't that bad. It wasn't the worst sponge I've ever eaten but it certainly wasn't the best.

Overall: 3/5 (it was okay...)

I would have been inclined to give this a higher mark if it weren't for the sponge which kind of ruined the whole thing for me. It wasn't a bad cupcake, it was just a bit disappointing.

The moral of the story ...

It's very easy to focus on the frosting as this is what really sets the cupcake a part from the muffin, but it is first and foremost a cake and so the sponge needs the most attention it can get.

You'll probably notice me get quite angry about sponge texture and taste as I feel it is too often wrongly neglected. I'd like to remind people that these are just my opinions and if you like Greggs cupcakes (I happen to like their doughnuts) then feel free too, I personally wont be re-purchasing.