I went to Florida this past weekend to spend time with my boyfriend and while I was there I thought it’d be fun to do some cupcake research.  Since I went to the Red Velvet cupcakery in DC I’ve had it in my head to do a little more research and seek out more cupcake locations (for science).  Naturally, boyfriend did not argue with cupcakes.

The cupcakery I chose was CamiCakes.

Quick side note: the first strike against them was the truly obnoxious music on their web site.  NEVER put music on your website without including a way to turn it off.  Otherwise it’s a super way to annoy your customers.  Thank god it at least wasn’t on every page. -_-

Anyway.

Initially the first location we went to was a little off-putting.  Even ignoring the excessively pink decorative theme, the cashier wasn’t the friendliest person I’ve met, and to top it all off he squished the tops of the cupcakes in the box he put them in.  I guess you could call these issues small or inconsequential when it comes down to the actual quality of the cupcakes, but I hate to undervalue presentation.  Really it was the squashed cupcakes that bothered me the most…if you have these tall, beautiful cupcakes that are obviously made for looks as well as taste (most/all of them have small decorations on the peak of the icing), why would you have carry-out boxes that can’t properly accommodate them?

Questionable presentation aside, the cupcakes were pretty durn good.  I was actually slightly unconvinced at first, but the more we tried, the more I found myself enjoying them.  We started off with a Classic Cami Chocolate on Chocolate and an Elvis cupcake (chocolate + banana + peanut butter).  Contrasted with Red Velvet’s cupcakes, the actual cakes themselves were of much better quality; they didn’t taste strange and were much more moist and pleasing to the palate.

On the subject of the cake base CamiCakes does something I like: they have “signature” yellow and chocolate cakes that they use for many of their cupcakes.  This means they have a certain level of consistency in their cupcakes, which I think is a good thing; as a consumer you can depend on any cupcake with their signature bases to be tasty (assuming you like their signature bases…which I think you would).  I assume this is something many cupcakeries (cupcakerys?) do, but I noticed it particularly in CamiCakes’ description of all their cupcake flavors.

We actually went to two different CamiCakes locations over the weekend, mostly because we couldn’t physically taste as many cupcakes as we wanted to all in one sitting; Tinseltown was the first.  There the Elvis was a fun first flavor; its icing was a cream cheesy-banana-peanut butter blend and was sweet without being overbearing.  With a moist chocolate cupcake base, it was definitely a good choice.  The Classic Chocolate on Chocolate was also good.  Though, while the chocolate buttercream icing was lighter and fluffier than the Elvis and had a wonderful flavor, it was a little too sweet for me.  Perhaps the double-chocolate was simply too much.

At the next location, Orange Park, we expanded our choices beyond chocolate; I specifically wanted to try out some flavors that included their classic yellow cake.  It was probably the best idea I had all day.

We chose the Classic Cami, the Chocolate Raspberry Almond Cream, and the Pineapple Toasted Coconut.  All three were excellent flavors and actually caused me to upgrade my initial “good” rating to a “very good.”  The Classic Cami includes their signature yellow cake with a plain buttercream icing, and it was fantastic.  I’m typically not a big yellow cake fan, but I feel like the cake tasted exactly the way a yellow cake should and the icing, unlike the chocolate buttercream, was not overly sweet; instead it was just the right amount to enhance the cake.

The Chocolate Raspberry Almond Cream was good, but I felt it lacked the nuances of each flavor it was supposed to contain.  The icing was a cream cheese style icing that I felt overloaded the delicate almond and raspberry flavors.  A little disappointing, but still a tasty cupcake with a moist chocolate base.  In contrast, the Pineapple Toasted Coconut equally contained all its necessary flavors and was also very good.  I like coconut and it was another nice diversion from my usually chocolate-only choices.

Each cupcake at both locations was $2.50, and I feel like that’s definitely a reasonable pricing for the value you get from them.  They were big, laden with icing, and delicious with creative flavors.  The presentation still bothers me some, but the cakes themselves are absolutely worth trying out (if you can bear to stare in the face of that much pink in order to get your sugar fix).  If you’re in the Jacksonville (or Atlanta!  It turns out there’s one in Atlanta too – hooray for me!) area, definitely make a trip to a CamiCakes if you find yourself with a sweet tooth.