LWF&D goes all Benedict Arnold at Crumbs

As I mentioned earlier, I've been battling a rather severe cupcake craving since my departure from Billy's. Today I was at the office planning my post-dinner indulgence. I got a window of time to duck out for a quick cupcake-shopping trip and realized my only real option was... Crumbs. Crumbs, the McDonald's of cupcakes, whose pastries are the size and shape of softballs and come in as many colors and flavors as Sanford Mr. Sketch markers (don't pretend you never ended up with colored dots on your nose from smelling those markers as a kid). Sigh. Off I went to the Crumbs by Bryant park.

After dinner, I unveiled my prey. It was a Butterfinger cupcake: vanilla cake, filled and frosted with Butterfinger buttercream and edged in chocolate chips. Overkill, much?

Looks innocent, but was almost as big as my head

I cut it in half and chose one of the halves, wrapping the other one for later. The filling job went admirably deep, almost all the way to the bottom of the center of the cake. I took one bite of the cake by itself, and... well, it was actually pretty good. Really moist, with an almost artificial vanilla flavor. Very much like cake mix. The Butterfinger frosting was totally intense, with a true Butterfinger taste and even some of the shattery texture, all thanks to the pieces of real Butterfinger mixed in. I could have done without the chocolate chips around the edge, but hey, they made it pretty. I ate half the cupcake and was full; ten minutes later I had stomach cramps. The other half went in the trash.

Well filled and frosted

While I'll never go to Crumbs if I can help it (i.e., if there are other, better cupcake options nearby), this particular cupcake was actually not as bad as some of their others-- I think the Butterfinger pieces actually helped mask the usual shortening-y taste of their frosting. But regardless, eating Crumbs is very much like eating McDonalds (in theory... I haven't eaten McDonald's in well over a decade): it tastes good, but it makes you feel both crappy and slightly guilty afterwards. Oh well. Consider the cupcake craving sated.