To think cupcakes are all fur coat and no knickers?

[StillCoughingandLaughing]

We’ve just been sent a batch of branded cupcakes from a client. They look absolutely amazing - colourful, intricate icing, wonderfully presented - but then I bit into one. Dry, dull and flavourless. The fancy buttercream icing is admittedly tasty (if a bit of a sugar overload), but the cake itself? Feels like a waste of 300 calories.

It got me thinking; most of the cupcakes I’ve had have been like this (apart from a couple of independent bakeries). They look beautiful and everyone oohs and aahs over them, but if you ignore the multicoloured icing flower with edible glitter, you’ve actually just got what tastes like a pound shop cake mix effort; the sort of thing you might make with the kids on a rainy day.

Am I the only one who doesn’t get excited about these all style no substance cakes? I’d much rather have a proper slab of cake with a gooey centre that actually tastes of something, regardless of how it looks.

Cupcakes are the most revolting thing ever, someone once gave us a very expensive box and sat there while we ate them. I needed to throw up later.

The cake isn’t nice enough, ever, and the ratio of sickly sweet icing to cake is also always all wrong.

They make a great display piece though.

I'm with you there. My children and I hate cup cakes. It's just a big lump of butter and icing sugar on top! Ew. My children's school had a cake sale recently and they didn't buy any, as they were all cup cakes! I bought them some Cadbury mini rolls from the shop instead. Give us a good cake like manor fruit cake, Victoria sponge or parkin 😍😍😍

I’m an avid baker and I agree with you.
The only cupcakes I’ve made that didn’t turn out drier than I’d like are any type that contain fresh fruit in the recipe before cooking ie carrot cake cupcakes. The raw fruit/veg explodes moisture as it cooks, but there’s not really much you can do for recipes that don’t call for it.
Vanilla cupcakes? Naa. I’ll eat the icing but not more than a bite of the actual cake itself.

Yanbu, I'm quite certain I've never eaten one and doubt I ever will. Would only do it if someone I cared about really wanted me to eat one!

And I feel the same about all those overdone fancy cakes. They leave me cold and I can't help thinking about all of the handling of the icing.

I'd rather eat almost anything else. I'd rather eat a cheese salad sandwich, honestly!

Also, when did they stop being fairy cakes and start being cupcakes? When they started paying more attention to the decoration on top than to the flavour on the cake.

Fairy cakes covered a whole lot of cakes - plain sponge, lemon flavoured, coffee flavoured, chocolate, with currants, with glace cherries etc. Usually water icing rather than butter cream - buttercream was reserved for things like butterfly cakes, where you sliced off a bit of the cake, added a blob of buttercream, cut the sliced off bit into two, stuck it in the buttercream like a pair of butterfly wings, dusted with icing sugar.

YANBU. Give me a great big dirty brownie any day.
Much better than an all mouth and no trousers cupcake.

Have had some unpleasant professionally made cakes, usually dry and often weird tasting. I wondered if it was because they are frozen or made in a certain way to make them last longer.

Some of the online ones have been awful, it's as if they were made to be dry and iced before packaging to be sent.

However, once had some that were really good, made into a little bouquet like flowers. Since then they have all been crap. I make my own now if I want some.

Yep, cup cakes are rank.

Nothing wrong with a lovely wee bun with some water icing on top.

Everyone I know follows our independent cupcake shop on fb. I had a peek and they are all gushing fools that sound pathetic salivating over F-ing cupcakes. (I've tried shop once and it's nice- but whatever 'flavour' you get, the actual cake is either chocolate or vanilla.

YABU.

A friend of mine lives in Cardiff and there is a coffee shop near by and they sell the most delicious cupcakes. They really are gorgeous. They have various fillings and are topped with loads of gorgeous buttercream and depending, on the cupcake you choose, a chocolate bar or sweet.

Last time I visited I tried the Battenberg cupcake. It had a gooey almond flavour centre and loads of buttercream topped by a small square of Battenberg cake.

If I lived nearer then I know I would be trying every cupcake they sell.

I agree, insofar as I don’t like cake and haven’t ever eaten a cupcake 😁

YABU I love cupcakes!

To use an old phrase from another thread, IMO cup cakes are all fur coat and no knickers 

Ha - just seen that was your original OP wording - YANBU!

You have to eat them right

YABVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVU
It depends where you get them from. I love a fuck ton of buttercream icing. Caramel, white chocolate or cream cheese are my favourites. I'm lucky to live in a city with a few good shops. My favourite shop makes super soft spongy cupcakes with dreamy thick and delightfully soft icing. I've had four this week.
Grudgingly I admit they're better than my home made ones.

YANBU - I don't even think of them as real cakes.

Totally agree. They usually dry out because of their small sod and I find the ratio of cake to icing totally off - way too much icing and it’s always too sweet! I love cake but would happily never eat a cupcake again. They are indisputably the worst of all cakes.

*small size!

I always get cupcakes instead of a proper birthday cake, but they come from a local shop that make them fresh every day, or will make them to order the night before you need them. They are expensive, but exquisite, springy and light never dry and have the perfect ratio of icing to sponge.