House of Cupcakes

The House of Cupcakes is not as trendy-looking as the 1950s-style Magnolia Bakery. The interior looks a little too sterile for a local bakery with its bright-white walls, white-tiled floors and glaring fluorescent lights. The large serving counter prevents customers from getting an intimate view of the day's cupcake selection.

The temptation can be irresistible, however. A 9-year-old boy in line couldn't help but shout out his six favorite flavors. At $2.25 a cupcake, it is a pricy mistake to choose the wrong flavor. After picking out six flavors with the assistance of the enthusiastic staff, the total rang up to $11.25. The House of Cupcakes offers a deal to soften the indulgence, though: buy half a dozen cupcakes and get the seventh free.

Unfortunately, there is no place to sit and enjoy the cupcakes inside the store. For now it is purely a take-out business, which takes away from the usual boutique-bakery charm. There are no costumers relaxing inside, enjoying their selections. There is no instant gratification with these cupcakes unless you walk out with the cupcake unwrapped and in hand.

The House of Cupcakes boasts a wide and unique selection of twists on the traditional cupcake. With more than 20 flavors, it is hard not to get excited about trying new concoctions like Peanut Butter Delight, Coconut Snowball, Butterscotch by Gosh and Chocolate Oreo, to name a few. Each cupcake looks perfectly prepared, the icing swirled to a perfect point with individual toppings to match each flavor. The Glad It's Sundae mimics an ice cream sundae with white icing, chocolate icing and a cherry.

Unfortunately, the appearance of each cupcake was more sumptuous than the actual taste. Somewhere between the design and the new flavors, The House of Cupcakes lost sight of the beautiful simplicity of a moist cupcake topped with sweet but not-too-sugary, icing. The Carrot Spectacular, Glad It's Sundae, Chocolate Oreo and Chocolate Buttercream were all dense and slightly dry. The Carrot Spectacular tasted more like thick spice cake than a light and fluffy carrot cake. Each cupcake was topped with ultra-sweet frosting whether it was traditional vanilla, buttercream or cinnamon flavored. The consistency and the sweetness were the same across flavors, and each icing tasted as if it were trying to mask the blandness of the actual cupcake.

The House of Cupcakes prides itself on baking fresh batches throughout the day and using ingredients from Belgian chocolate to Madagascar Bourbon vanilla, but before it shoots for the stars, it needs to refocus on the delicious and simple basics of the traditional cupcake.

House of Cupcakes is located at 30 Witherspoon Street.