The other day while driving down 8th St, I noticed a sign for the Cupcake Corner. About time I thought! I have been waiting for someone in Saskatoon to take advantage of the cupcake craze for a couple of years now. I could wonder why it's taken so long, but then again, we don't have an Olive Garden either (a post for another time).
Friday afternoon I stopped at the Cupcake Corner with my 3 boys for an end-of-the-week treat on the way home from school/work. I thought the sign looked cute, which lead me to expect cute things inside. Not so. The layout of the store is very strange. When we walked in we were greeted (and by that I mean not greeted) with the site of a man sitting at a desk that looked like it would be much more at home in a Travel Office; low and big. I felt a moment's unease wondering if they were just specializing in custom orders, but out of the corner of my eye I spotted the bakery display WAY off to the back of the store. That's more like it, bring on the cupcakes! The woman working the counter was friendly and the cupcakes looked good but somewhat boring. Alek was impressed with the big Oreo cupakes so we got one of those and a variety of six mini's to try. I was expecting something clever and imaginative, not just basic cupcakes like chocolate, banana, strawberry and peanut butter. Where are the clever names? I want to be enticed!
I'm hoping that the lack of store design and character was due to the fact that they had only been open for 2 days. I'm being generous. The only decorations were the menu board and a "Yay, you're open!" bouquet. Boring, boring, boring. Even the walls were bland, I'm sure they were white??? Obviously not very memorable. Funk it up people. Funk. It. Up. Even the take out containers could use some work. The cupcakes were placed inside clear plastic containers, no dividers and no branding on the container. Even a cute, Cupcake Corner sticker would help. The cupcakes did make it home in one piece though, so that's a good thing.
On to the cupcakes...
When we got home we decided to have a cupcake sampling picnic on the floor. Alek gobbled his Oreo cupcake up in record time and was looking for taste of the others. Lukas enjoyed the icing off his chocolate cupcake with vanilla icing (he crumbed the cupcake itself) and Mikah LOVED his lemon cupcake so much that I caught him sneaking the other one later in the evening. I tried parts of the peanut butter cupcake (icing was good, chocolate cupcake was not as moist as it could be); the chocolate chocolate (icing was rich and delicious); and a lick of the lemon icing (tasted like lemon extract).
Verdict:
Alek: gave it a thumb and a half. He wanted the Oreo cupcake to taste exactly like an oreo (total Aspy response), he thought the cupcake was a bit too dry - and not as good as mom's.
Lukas: enjoyed the sweet icing and especially loved crumbling the cupcake all over the floor. Then again, he loves doing this with all his food.
Mikah: had seconds.
Me: I thought the cupcakes were good but not exceptional. They lacked depth of flavour and ingredients. Overall marketing could use a flavour infusion.
I'll be interested to hear what others have to say. Go try them out and see what you think.
1 comment:
I couldn't have said it better.
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