September 13, 2005
Cupcake vs. cupcake vs. cupcake
Oh, who doesn't love a food fight, especially when it involves something that should be so sweet and harmless as cupcakes?
It seems the West Village cupcake king, Magnolia Bakery, is in a major feud with Buttercup Bake Shop in Midtown, which is in court with the Little Cupcake Bakeshop in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.
The fight is chronicled at length in New York magazine: Given the animosity between the competing bakeries, the Cosa Nostra analogy is not entirely inappropriate. New York’s cupcake genealogy, however, might better be traced using the model of Old Testament bloodlines. Together, Appel and a high-school friend, Allysa Torey, begat Magnolia Bakery in 1996. When their partnership, and friendship, dissolved in 1999, Magnolia begat Buttercup. In 2003, Magnolia begat Billy’s, a bakery in Chelsea, opened by a former Magnolia manager, and Buttercup begat Sugar Sweet Sunshine, started by two former Buttercup employees. Now there are at least a half-dozen similar bakeries throughout Manhattan and Brooklyn, with such jolly names as Baked, Happy Happy Happy, Polka Dot Cake Studio, and Cupcake Caboose (an all-cupcake catering company), each serving up cupcakes topped with dollops of sugary frosting swirled artfully like beehive hairdos. The disagreements have to do with recipies, borrowed concepts, Rice Krispie treats and all sorts of other things that let redeaders conjure up notions of catfights, and yes, sex. Since Magnolia was featured on "Sex in the City," the tour bus crowd makes a stop at the store. But Magnolia wasn't able to provide enough cupcakes to a full bus at once, so the tour company opted instead to buy from a rival and eat them across the street from Magnolia, according to the magazine.
"The tour’s operators, when explaining to patrons why they aren’t getting Magnolia cupcakes, have been known to insinuate that Torey and Appel were once lesbian lovers, since split," New York reports.
No word yet from the food bloggers at Cupcakes Take the Cake: All Cupcakes All the Time. Other New York-based dessert blogs include Lovescool: For the Love of Dessert.
CORRECTION: The Cupcakes Take the Cake blog has indeed weighed in on the controversy ... all the way back in July.
Earlier: 'Sex' tours of Manhattan
Cupcake obsession
September 13, 2005 09:40 AM in Downtown, Foodology, Midtown, Out of Manhattan
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