Just Desserts boxed cupcakes

I know. I KNOW. I should have been more careful. I spied this box of Just Desserts cupcakes in a local grocery store and even though I am here, and this blog is here, to prevent consumption of grocery story cupcakes, Just Desserts is a local San Francisco bakery. Local bakery with goods in stores must be good, yes? Plus, I was won over by the display table. This box of cupcakes sat alongside other pretty cookies and unique and luscious-looking desserts.

I practically HAD to buy these. Plus, they say they are all natural and "scratch baked." I thought they would be all yummy.



So how were they?
Delicious. That's what they were. The cake was tres moist and the frosting was sweet. I was inclined to say it was too sweet, but my husband, who is generally not a huge sweet fan, liked it a lot. The all-important frosting really was good, and while it was a bit light for my taste, there was nothing wrong with it at all.

I liked these a lot. Kudos, Just Desserts! They were the best packaged cupcake I've had. You could easily pass these off as bakery-fresh cupcakes and no one would be the wiser.

Kara's Cupcakes, San Francisco

I visited the Ghirardelli Square location of Kara's Cupcakes. I was with family visiting from out of town, and I must say that as soon as I finished explaining the Cupcake Quest to them, they were all in favor of visiting Kara's, for "research."

Marketing
Kara's Cupcakes, it must be said, is the most high-end cupcakery I've ever seen. It looks like a pristine jewelry shop. Kara's gets high marks for brand and marketing, right down to the logo and packaging. It needs to, because cupcakes are priced apiece at $3.75. Yikes! I mentioned that we were getting cupcakes for the blog, and that I'm on a Quest for the best cupcake, but the shop girl wasn't impressed at all (and unfortunately, no free cupcakes were forthcoming. I don't expect free ones, but I'm just saying).

How many and what
Since there were a lot of us, I felt it necessary to purchase a load of cupcakes. This was both spectacularly stupid and also brilliant. It was stupid because there was no way of telling the cupcakes would be good or not--for all I knew they could taste like used motor oil. But that's where the branding did its job--the appearance of the fancy-pants shop assured me I'd be getting a high end cupcake. But getting a lot was also brilliant because as it turned out later, my family and I had a cupcake tasting party and then rated each one. And overall, the cupcakes were good.

I got the following: a Sweet Chocolate (chocolate cupcake with a sugary sweet chocolate frosting), Meyer Lemon with lemon custard filling, Vanilla with vanilla frosting (for control group purposes), raspberry chocolate with raspberry filling, and Strawberry vanilla.

How the cupcakes fared
The chocolate frosting tasted like the dreaded grocery store version--that indescribable lard taste, and I didn't like it (I think this was called the "sugary sweet" frosting). However! My cousin said she liked it because she prefers a lighter, whipped style frosting. So it really depends on your taste. I prefer thick hunks of buttercream on mine. But there was unanimous agreement that the Meyer Lemon cupcake, with lemon filling, was absolutely scrumptious (and it had thick buttercream frosting!). The raspberry was good, as was the strawberry, but the plain vanilla was a little too sweet (and plain). In all, I think we liked the ones with the extra filling in them, but with buttercream frosting.

Perhaps best of all was the way that my family dived into the taste test portion of the Quest. We divided up all the cupcakes into equal pieces and all tried. It was a lot of fun, and a great way to conduct future tastings. So, thank you, Kara's for providing a fun evening for my family.

Mission Minis

Let me tell you, the East Bay seems to have all the cupcake places. I work over in the Marin side of things, and finding a decent cupcake in that area should be a snap, right? After all, what do Marin moms have to do but eat sumptuous cupcakes all day? (Okay, I'm kidding.) (Not really.) (A little.) (Shhhh.)

So I've pretty much got my eyes wide open when it comes to cupcakes in Marin. I had lunch at the Askew Grill in Strawberry Village in Mill Valley today and they had a lovely little covered glass cake stand (always a nice thing to see) full of darling cupcake minis. They are Mission Minis from San Francisco.

I drooled a bit and made it quite clear to the lady at the counter that I would have two. I picked vanilla and Aztec Chocolate. I would have liked the pink lemonade but it didn't look like those were there.

I explained to my coworker that these darling minis were extremely scientific research, and offered her some with slightly bad grace. I wanted them for myself, you see, and they were so very small. Just right to pop in my mouth all at once, were I alone, but seeing as I didn't want to appear as a vulgar pig, I had to take ladylike bites that went entirely against my every urge. I wasn't able, I'm sorry to say, to refrain from waiting until a more opportune time to eat them and actually began eating them as we walked from Askew Grill to the car. Eating and walking is never that preferable, but it had to be done.

The first to be devoured was the Aztec chocolate. According to the Mission Minis web site, it's dark aztec chocolate cake with vanilla bean buttercream topped with black nonpariels. (As you can see in the picture there, the black nonpariels* appear to be entirely absent). The vanilla is classic vanilla bean cake with vanilla bean buttercream topped with colored organic nonpareils.

*I totally didn't even know what a nonpariel was until just now. They're those cut little round sprinkles.

Mes amies, I need to tell you, the frosting did not taste like buttercream at all. Now, it pains me to say this because I very much like Mission Minis name and logo, and I desperately want to try the pink lemonade cupcake. But the frosting tasted strongly of cream cheese, and I must say, it was rather a disappointment because it was slightly greasy. Not like the Dreaded Grocery Store greasy frosting, but nearly. Also, and it pains me to say this more, the cake was um...not as fresh as it could be. I detected just a bit of hardness to it. Now, normally this would be fine and I'm betting that when these little dreams are fresh, they're DEEELISH. But today, they were a bit old at the ol' Askew Grill, and the frosting a bit greasy.

I'd still stop by their store though, and give them a second chance. Their store front is at 3168 22nd Street, San Francisco.