Meetup 2 - Sticky Fingers Bakery

This past Saturday we had our second DC/Metro Cupcake Group Meetup! (By the way, the group is now 103 members strong!) It was held at Sticky Fingers Bakery in DC. Sticky Fingers is a vegan bakery that was voted Best Bakery by the readers of Washington City Paper for their 2008 Best of DC Contest, so we thought it would be a fun and different place to try out.

Despite delays on the metro lines all day, there were about 14 or 15 of us that came out. We staked out our little corner of the shop and sat down with some iced coffee and cupcakes. (You'll have to forgive me...I don't have a lot of pretty cupcake pictures this time as a lot of them came out pretty blurry.)

The first cupcake we tried was the Cookies n Cream. It was a chocolate cake cupcake with a white frosting. The chocolate cake was decent. It was thick and moist, which was good, but the frosting had this flour-like after taste that a lot of the group members didn't like. I mean a frosting that tastes like flour? Blah.

Next up was the Vanilla Cupcake with Vanilla Frosting. The frosting here was much better, definitely on the sweeter side compared to the Cookies n Cream frosting, but still with that floury after taste. The vanilla cake, on the other hand, was no good. Very bland and a little on the dry side.

The last one I tried was the Peanut Butter Fudge. The chocolate cake in this cupcake tasted better than the Cookies n Cream version. It was very dark, practically black, and very moist. The frosting on top was good, not sweet but definitely not bland, and had a nice dollop of peanut butter in the center. This one, along with the Almond Creme, were the group favorites. I didn't try the Almond Creme because I was too stuffed from everything else, but if you're ever around Sticky Fingers I would keep these as your go-to flavors.

Other members tried the Raspberry Chocolate, but weren't too crazy about that one either. I wish we had a vegan join us so they could tell us how these cupcakes rank of the list of other Vegan desserts they've tried!

My overall review is that considering Sticky Fingers cupcakes are dairy/lactose-free, egg-free, cholesterol-free, low in saturated fat, and made with soy and non-hydrogenated oils, they didn't turn out too bad. However with all the other fine and delleicious cupcakes in the area, I don't think I'll be returning to Sticky Fingers any time soon. Yes, other bakeries may be higher in fat, but at least I'm getting what I paid for (about $2.75 each).

One more thing before I leave this post, I thought I would see if anyone out there has ever made cupcakes, or any dessert for that matter, that are free of allergin's such as wheat and dairy, etc? One of our group members bakes for children who have severe allergies. She is looking for ideas and as you can imagine it's pretty hard to come up with a dessert recipe that doesn't contain these kind of products. If you know of or have ever used any recipe that's free of these ingredients, please share! Thanks!