'C' IS FOR CUPCAKE CATASTROPHE…read more
I'm glad to support this Puerto Rican bakery, even if a few things badly missed the mark.
Borinken Cakes is a small restaurant and baked goods shop on Archer Ave, just east of Cicero in the Garfield Ridge neighborhood of Chicago. My wife insisted on coming here to try their 'tripleta' (a meat-heavy sandwich) as well as buy a few beloved pastries.
The Cubano ($13) was better than average: roast pork, ham, pickles, mustard, and swiss cheese on lightly buttered 'pan sobao' (soft sweet bread). The sandwich itself was dry, a splash of hot sauce helped. Sadly, it doesn't come with chips or Yuca fries.
The specialty coquito ($6) was a lot of fun, an eggnog-like drink with blue matcha powder and strawberry drizzle added to emulate the Puerto Rican flag. My wife got a fresh mango juice ($3.75) and a Puerto Rican coffee ($3) she said was "like a weak Keurig".
Unfortunately, the cupcakes--which are supposed to be soaked--had all sorts of issues. Our experience with half a dozen cupcakes was brutal; either they were bone dry or had a troubling gritty texture, like wet sand. At least 1 went straight in the trash.
Funny enough, our 3yo (a sweets lover) took one bite and spit it out, which we amounted to her being a picky eater. Later on, I tried a spoonful of the same cupcake and damn near had the same reaction! Turns out, little miss was right....and at $5/ea these weren't cheap blunders, either.
They had magna-tiles and crayons to keep kids entertained, which we appreciated. The girl behind the counter wasn't very friendly, and though my interactions with her were brief, my wife detected an attitude while she placed an order. Ooof, not your finest hour mi gente.
* TL;DR *
Though I'm no expert baker, I can't imagine bungling a cupcake as badly as they did here.
The quesitos were fine, but the acclaimed cupcakes had us shaking our heads in disappointment. One was drier than Death Valley, the next was like faceplanting into wet sand. It's one thing to be lacking flavor, but a poor texture is an immediate 'no'.
Cuban was tasty if a little pricey; for $13 it oughta come with something more than air. Employees could benefit from some customer service re-training and the house coffee tasted like a K-cup pod (wife's words, not mine).
It pains me to leave a lukewarm review for a Boricua business, but cupcakes priced at $5/ea need to be high quality and the ones at Borinken Cakes fell way short of expectations.
