Albany’s Cupcake Wars Get Scientific
I donated my body to science, or at least to a worthy cause – determining once and for all, who makes the best cupcakes in Albany, NY.
Before Daniel, my friend at All Over Albany and FUSSYlittleBLOG, put loyalty to the test, I have been known to stalk Bettie and her marvelous cupcakes, and to rave about Coccadots. I’ve even pitted one against the other in a homegrown Cupcake Wars.
But a funny thing happens when you eliminate blind spots formed by packaging and expectations. Cupcakes that I once thought amazing, came up far short in a blind taste test.
Daniel B., best known for his crusade to raise the level of culinary offerings in the Capital Region, brought together 20 readers of FUSSYlittleBLOG.com, for a hush-hush event at the Albany Hilton Garden Inn. We were sworn to secrecy so that the bakeries wouldn’t be alerted; the plan being to serve the same cupcakes that anyone might buy on a weekend.
Given that some cupcakes were stale while others picked up unpleasant refrigerator scents and flavors, it was clear that this was as level a playing field as it gets. And I was shocked to discover that a cupcake that I described as “gross” came from one of my favorite bakeries – Bettie, how could you fail me so?
At the reveal, I argued that maybe this wasn’t a fair test since who would spend a fortune for plain old vanilla or chocolate cupcakes? I go to specialty cupcake bakeries for – you guessed it! – specialty cupcakes.
But Daniel thought of that, offering a specialty cupcake round of what turns out to be the universal Capital Region flavor – Peanut Butter Cup.
Sadly, most of these peanut butter cup cupcakes were built on a foundation of chocolate cake, so the abject failure of the one colored the experience of the other. Bottom line, if you didn’t like the chocolate cupcakes you probably aren’t going to like the peanut butter cupcakes.
Read all about it on All Over Albany: Tasting Capital Region cupcakes.
