Ottawa Foodies

4

Baaarghh... I felt weirdly honour bound to give this place another try after @hipfunkyfun responded to my dismissal of the dry, barren treats I brought to my mother's place last fall.

While a second chance left me with a better impression of these cupcakes they are still not IMO worth $3.50 a pop. I gave the Red Velvet another try as these would seem to be the gold standard by which cupcakes are to be judged (and listen to me, like I know anything about cupcakes! ;o))

To share in the calorie guilt, I got a Key Lime cupcake with cream cheese icing for my husband. We bit in, exchanged, took second and third bites, and then agreed: meh. Simply not worth the calorie hit or the money.

Blindfolded I'd have guessed that the Key limes were vacationing in Florida, while the Red Velvet had no definitive flavour whatsoever, certainly not of chocolate. On both counts the cream cheese icing was the best part, and it still tasted of little more than sugar with barely any tang from the cheese. While these were a great improvement on the dry, week old experience from our first try (we actually finished these cupcakes), my husband remembers the Betty Crocker mixes from the 70s as being more flavourful.

If your hips are crying out for sugary carbs IMO there are far better ways to indulge yourself. So for me this place is a pass and presents no imminent danger to my figure. Thankfully, the best cupcake I've had in recent memory was at the new Serious Cheese location in Kanata, far out of my way and far out of my reach.

We've been on the hunt for cupcakes for our upcoming wedding. After trying a few along Bank, we decided to give the Cupcake Lounge a shot. The store itself is pretty simple, with the cupcakes on display behind a glass counter, along with a couple chairs and a few stand up tables.

They usually have 8-10 flavours of cupcake: some standards available every day, others specific to the day. Presentation of the cupcakes doesn't involve a tower of icing, but instead a lower, rounder arrangement of icing that makes it easier to get a bite of cupcake + icing. I prefer this, but they still pack a lot of icing on there!. The cakes themselves were moist, particularly the lemon and spice types (e.g. chai latte, maple cinnamon). The plain vanilla cupcake with buttercream icing was delicious as well, although I think I taste maybe a hint of white chocolate. I find the icing here, whether buttercream or cream cheese-based, is very smooth. The red velvet was the only one I tried that I wasn't a huge fan of, but I don't tend to go for it normally.

The owner herself was lovely. We met her in consultation and she let us sample any flavours we wished. She was also willing to do a little 6" cake for the top tier at a very reasonable rate. Overall, I was very happy with the experience and will update once the wedding has happened.

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@hipfunkyfun: Hmmm... what can I say? They were about as moist as week old bread. Seriously. My mother worked in the restaurant business for years and her first comment was that these were old product. Which is exactly what they tasted like but didn't make sense since Red Velvet is usually one of the most popular cupcake flavours.

Given that in the time since I've visited others have had positive experiences, I'll stop by again when I'm in the Market and give them one more try to see if I had just visited on an off day.

I finally got to try the Cupcake Lounge last week and was very pleased.

I got the Red Velvet (delish), pumpkin (very good) and ginger and lemon (the flavourings could have been stronger).

Overall I was pleased with it all. The cake part was very moist and the icing was tasty and plentiful.

Had a foursome of cupcakes from here yesterday...
...red velvet, coconut chocolate, chai latte and some sort of maple vanilla something something...

...all were tasty, fresh and different. I note that the Lounge does a curious 'low round' icing approach as opposed to various other places that pile a massive amount of icing on top, but i wasn't bothered by only a semi-overdrive sugar trip.

EDIT TO ADD they were almost as good the second day!

Johanna - I'm curious about your experience, since mine was positive.

For my only taste test, I split a pumpkin cupcake. From experience pumpkin always makes a really lovely moist cake, I use it in my baking all the time. The frosting was heavy with cream cheese too.

I really wanted to taste a chocolate or vanilla to really see what the shop is like, because if they can't do the basic flavours right, I find it really disappointing and won't go back. The pumpkin was my date's choice though, so I didn't get a chance. I will try another flavour the next time I am down there. I have yet to find a really good vanilla or chocolate cupcake in this city!

Stopped by last month to pick up some cupcakes for dinner with my family. Got 2 red velvet, 2 cinnamon and 2 maple, cut each in half and no one took more than one bite of these bland, dried out mounds of cake. Enough said. The red velvet were a particular disappointment so suffice it to say that I won't be back.

shared a pumpkin cupcake here today. the pumpkin cake was light and moist. the icing was cream cheese and had a true cream cheese tang to it. was a good cupcake, but at $3.41 (including tax), it is a very pricey treat for such a small cake.

I tried the Red Velvet cupcake.. too much icing, if that's possible, and the icing didn't taste unique, it tasted like butter and cream cheese smushed together.
The cupcake itself was dry and dense with little flavour of its own; it feels as though the excess of icing is to hide that.

I could make better cupcakes at home.

I've tasted a variety of cupcakes from The Cupcake Lounge, and I can definitely give them a big thumbs up on texture, quality of ingredients, size, and icing:cake ratio, but as far as the very important category of flavour goes, they fall seriously flat. And I was really excited for a delicious Strawberry cupcake, at last! Sigh.

While the majority of their flavour combinations sound absolutely delectable on first sight, such as Key Lime or Ginger-Orange, they are only a barely-there sensation for the tastebuds. Disappointing, given that the cupcake itself, flavour aside, is very good.

I continue to visit, however, for their vanilla cupcake, which is always my go-to at any cupcake shop. The subtlety of flavour actually compliments this particular cupcake quite well and is definitely my favourite vanilla cupcake in all of Ottawa. Vanilla die-hards beware, however, there is also a taste of white-chocolate mingling in there, so it's not 100% vanilla in my opinion - but delicious nonetheless.

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After dinner boyfriend and I were looking for desert when we came across the Cupcake Lounge.

I've been here once before and tried their key lime cupcakes and enjoyed them.

This time I decided to try their Strawberry cupcakes. I use to make cupcakes all the time, so I was a little disappointed when they didn't have chunks of strawberry pieces in the cake. Which means they use some strawberry puree since the batter did have a light pink hue, with some strawberry flavouring.

The big plus is that they use butter, you can taste it in their icing which is a huge plus for me since I don't eat shortening.

Would I go back?? Maybe, the cake was moist, the icing perfect. Will probably go back if I'm in the area and in the mood for something sweet.

3

I have tried cupcakes across North America, in Ottawa, and recently a couple at The Cupcake Lounge. They had a lot of different flavours. We took the key lime and the red velvet for a test drive.

The key lime had a delectable cream cheese icing, just the right combination of sour and sweet, and the cake was pretty moist...

The red velvet was very good and I have tried a lot of red velvet cupcakes in my days. The cream cheese icing in my opinion was not too sweet at all, had a great taste to it, and the cake was not dry either but moist... in fact I would have to say these were better than any cupcakery that I have gone to in LA, Washington or NYC.

They didn't cheat on neither icing nor cake so we feel we got our money's worth.

I heard they only opened a month or two ago.

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I was excited seeing the coming soon sign on the door and the butcher paper in the windows. Watched them as they moved in and eventually open but decided to be patient and waited a while after opening to make sure they were set.

Today I had a my first cupcake from The Cupcake Lounge! I opted for a favorite - The red velvet cake because I was so happy to see it on a menu. (Admittedly it is probably not the best choice as it is usually done quite poorly or really well. Not much in between.)

(Background: My first red velvet cake was years ago and was a killer example of just how good they can be. It was at Jacques-Imo's Cafe with a bunch of New Orleans locals/friends for my birthday. It was unexpected and lovely and left such a food memory.)

I really wanted to love their stuff but was greatly disappointed. (I suppose I still might if I opt to try something else?) We shared one and had waited till we got home to slice it down the centre.

I tried a bit of the cake itself (bottom) before diving into the icing top. *sigh* It was moist enough (my guy was critical of its texture, I thought it was fine) but sadly it was mostly flavourless. Skipped over to the top and tried the icing. The sweet cream cheese frosting was a bit on the too sweet for me side. Then tried the whole thing together,( as intended for a cupcake) thinking that the whole would be greater than the sum of its parts. All I tasted was icing but a bit better than before. I think the cake helped dilute the sweetness a bit and then I did taste a bit of the cream cheese tang.

I feel that saying it was mediocre would be generous and it was definitely not worth the price (or calories). If you have a better experience with another flavour please let us know. I may try again.

Where is the shop? I thought you could only get them at the candy shop on weekends.

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Wanted to try the new cupcake shop in my work 'hood this week, so I picked up a carrot cupcake at lunch on Tuesday. I liked how they actually spread the icing out so it wasn't just a pretty and inedible pile in the middle of the cake. Good cake-to-icing ratio also - and awesome carrot cake goodness with nuts! And good cream cheese icing, not too sweet. Overall - a hit! The ladies behind the counter were super nice there too. Time will tell if there is enough business in the market for two cupcakeries, but I think this will be my go-to cupcake shop!