Author: ENU

That Takes The Cake
5855 MacArthur Blvd  Oakland, CA
http://thattakesthecake.co/shop/
Review date: July 2013

This cupcake bakery originally gained its reputation from a location on Union Street (Cow Hollow/Marina) in San Francisco which opened in 2007. In 2012 the ownership changed hands and the store moved to a very odd location in East Oakland, right behind Mills College which is close to where we live. 

Although this area is not as bad as 98^th Avenue, it is completely understandable to Oakland residents that this tiny storefront has not only bars on the window but a locked iron screen door where they have to buzz you in for entrance before you can buy anything.

Neither Carlos nor I are cupcake fans, but Inez loves sweet stuff so we stopped by one day after her Friday Tai Chi class, as we pass right by this place on our route. They have different flavors on each day of the week, so I'd recommend checking the website for what they're offering that day.

We picked four of various flavors: Key lime, Peach, Chocolate with raspberry frosting, Chocolate with Salted Caramel/Coconut frosting. Carlos also bought a cinnamon roll, which was a huge mistake as he confused it with a walnut sticky bun, which we infinitely prefer. But Inez was happy with everything, so that was fine.

The good: clean true flavors, reasonably moist cake.

The bad: Super-sweet buttercream frosting with very little butter taste. We are not buttercream fans anyway, as we're firm believers in ganache. 

I jazzed up the cinnamon roll with butter, brown sugar, and chopped toasted pecans – sheesh, by the time I was finished I could have made an entire batch of sticky buns using frozen puff pastry – which made it tolerable once we reheated it in the microwave. Otherwise, it's all too-thick super sweet dough, too little cinnamon (so little I actually couldn't tell if it was true Ceylon cinnamon or cheaper cassia), very little powdered sugar icing. Chain shop Cinnabon is better, to be honest.

We can't say we were very impressed. Many people love TTTC, but I guess we're just not ever going to be cupcake lovers. These are nice folks, but our local food scene is really progressing fast, so there's better options available nowadays.

If you're looking for cupcakes to try, my niece loves cupcakes and for her birthday last month, ordered an assortment from CupKates, a cupcake truck vendor (https://cupkatesbakery.com/menu-ordering). CupKates are as moist, and much less sickeningly sweet on the frosting, so it's a far better bet than This Takes The Cake. She also recommends the cupcakes at Sweet Bar Bakery in Oakland's Uptown (Broadway & 24^th St., http://www.sweetbarbakery.com/menu/), which is a full service bakery and café.