Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Sprinkles Cupcakes - Palo Alto, CA


Chai and Strawberry Cupcake

AJ and I took a trip over to Sprinkles to try out the famed West Coast cupcakes, which may have started the whole cupcake craze. The story behind Sprinkles is pretty interesting. The husband/wife team left their jobs as investment bankers to make cupcakes! Apparently they work more hours now than when they were working in banking. You can read more about their story on their website.

Suffice to say, their hard work pays off, the cupcakes at Sprinkles are moist and fluffy, with the perfect amount of frosting. They offer a plethora of flavors, which allowed us to indulge our sweet tooths by getting four cupcakes, instead of two. I mean we had to try a couple different flavors, right? Plus their chai cupcake is only on the menu once a week - what luck! Don't worry we spaced out our consumption.



Chai Cupcake with Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting.

After a couple minutes of scanning the long menu, we decided on the pumpkin, strawberry, chai, and chocolate marshallow. Each cupcake comes with a decorative sugar button on top. The colors distinguish one cupcake from the next. While cute, these buttons were not tasty.

After discarding the button, a bite into the chocolate marshmallow revealed an intense dark chocolate frosting - with a slightly bitter taste. Fans of dark chocolate will be pleased in that the ganache isn't cloying. The chocolate cake was moist and filled with a marshmallow creme. While enjoyable, this homage to the hostess cupcake wasn't my favorite. Again, diehard chocolate fans will be pleased.

The strawberry and chai cupcakes were similar in that they were extremely light. The flavors were somewhat muted. I enjoyed the strawberry cupcake, but would have liked a more intense strawberry flavor to the cake. Again the chai spices were toned down in the cake.

The hands-down favorite was the pumpkin cupcake with cinnamon cream cheese icing. The cupcake was bursting with pumpkin, like cinderella's carriage after midnight. The cream cheese frosting had the perfect balance of sweetness and slight tanginess.

Bottom Line: At 3.25 these cupcakes are rather large, but the cake is so light, you won't feel bad eating another. And trust me, you won't be able to eat just one.

Sprinkles
393 Stanford Shopping Center
Palo Alto, CA

4 comments:

Malia said...

Nice cinderella reference! :) Those cupcakes look delish. How did they compare to Gtown cupcakes?

Ariel said...

They are bigger than gtown cupcakes, but just as tasty. The cake is super moist and light. I am a fan! You must try them when you visit!

Gastronomer said...

I too appreciated the "like cinderella's carriage after midnight" reference.I'm glad you dug Sprinkles! I wish I found myself in Beverly Hills more often.

How To Eat A Cupcake said...

Glad to hear a GOOD review about Sprinkles. I've heard so many "they're all hype" comments!