If you've read this blog for any length of time (thanks!!) you'll know that Buttercup in Kensington (and now Westfield) is one of my all time favourite cupcake places. Unfortunately my love of Buttercup has now been thrown into doubt, following a visit on Wednesday.
It was a work colleagues birthday and she mentioned previously she's like to try a cookies and cream cupcake - so I thought I'd pop to Buttercup and get her one as Manny'd previously had a beautiful one from there and said it was one of the best he'd tasted. I took the morning off work and headed to Kensington. When I arrived I was disappointed to see that the display case was half full and those cupcakes that were there were kinda sad looking. I wish I'd taken a photo (and then just left) to share how sad it looked. I asked if they had any cookies and cream and was told they were "too difficult to frost early in the mornings", it was 11am and they'd been open since before 9am but anyways I was there and I didn't really have time to go anywhere else so I got 4 cupcakes - a Fantasy (vanilla) and a Chocolate Purist for my work colleagues and a vanilla (for me) and chocolate purist for Manny. As the two for work colleagues were gifts I asked for separate boxes and was charged 50p each for the privilege - even though at £2.50 a pop for half frosted cupcakes they're amongst the most expensive in London!!!
So to the half frosted - both vanilla cupcakes were half frosted - and STALE!!!! Again with the stale vanilla cupcakes. When I bake cupcakes we are still able to eat them 4 days later and they don't taste this stale - I really think that if this was my first ever foray into the world of cupcake I'd have just given up there and then - which may be a good thing for my waistline I have to say. The two chocolate ones I'm told were moist and fresh - maybe they sell quicker as they're more popular so aren't left on the shelf for so long? I really don't know. All I know was this cupcake made me feel nauseous to the point I couldn't eat it and is there a sadder feeling than throwing a cupcake in the bin? The frosting was hard also - obviously not fresh and quite tasteless - quite a difference from their usual vanilla cupcake which I've previously announced as one of my favourite cupcakes ever.
I was really disappointed on Wednesday - I'd wasted a half day at work - not to mention money on cupcakes that were inedible, I also felt awful that my friend may be tucking into a stale cupcake for her birthday (thankfully her chocolate one was ok - my friend with the fantasy one was not so lucky). Next time I'll go to Hummingbird who've yet to let me down.
Also - please note: having someone try to shove a big box of cupcakes into a bag that he couldn't fit the single cupcake box into is not good for your business.
