Monday 8 November 2010

When is a cupcake not a cupcake?

Yesterday was my 30th birthday. Now my lovely girlfriend bought me 2 giant cupcakes from Asda (with sparklers and fireworks I have to add). I love cake, so I was obviously grateful, but the size of them got me questioning whether they were actually cupcakes or not. So I went and found the definition of a cupcake, from the obvious source of Wikipedia: 'A cupcake (British English: fairy cake; Australian English: patty cake or cup cake) is a small cake designed to serve one person, frequently baked in a small, thin paper or aluminum cup. As with larger cakes, frosting and other cake decorations, such as sprinkles, are common on cupcakes.' So when it serves more than one person, it's no longer a cupcake. Even though it still looks and acts like one. Though does one person eating in it in more than one sitting count, so then it remains a cupcake. The other thing is fairy cakes are those little piddly things my Mum used to make, not the monsters I make. So are mine actually muffins and not cupcakes? I though muffins were cupcakes which hadn't got dressed yet, or were a bit on the ugly side. Is there a size guide somewhere. Well apparently so. According to Bake Me I'm Yours: Cup Cake there are 4 sizes. These are Very Little, Little, Not So Little & Not At All Little. Or petit fours, mini muffin, fairy cake and muffin sizes. Still doesn't really define the actual size. A lot of people argue that cupcakes here in the UK are fairy cakes, and in the US are muffins. So let's see what Martha Stewart says. Well she doesn't define it either, but size to line muffin tins. So what I guess is that a cupcake is actually just a really pretty muffin. It's muffin sized and has frosting, and is usually sweet. Giant cupcakes are huge cakes decorated to look like a cupcake, but not technically an actual cupcake. Still, they taste pretty good.

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