Raspberry Chocolate cupcake from Hotcakes Bakes

Cupcakes @ Hotcakes Bakes
photo by Nikki DeMartini

After spending a week in L.A my Dad sent me back home the best way possible, with a cupcake! 

Situated along South Centinela Avenue, Hotcakes Bakes is a full service bakery offering wedding cakes, classic cakes, custom cakes and of course cupcakes (plus a variety  of other desserts). Since it's right by LAX, my Dad and I made a pit stop and he treated me to a treat for my flight. 

Boarded up with bumble-gum pink colored ply wood, the storefront isn't much to see as it's currently under construction but the inside is pure chic cuteness! An assortment of colorful cupcakes, regular sized and mini, fill two glass pastry displays which take up most of the store. The pink wall across from them have shelves full of other baked goodies. 

The tall, fluffy, piles of frosting that sit on top of all of their cupcakes caught my eye. Especially the bright, colorful frosting that topped the lemon, strawberry and raspberry chocolate cupcakes. And the beyond Buttermilk, what could be considered a boring flavor was made fun with an awesome tie-dye frosting! 

In addition to standard flavors like chocolate, vanilla, red velvet and even my favorite yellow cake with chocolate frosting, they also offer some unique flavors like Snickerdoodle, Boston cream pie and English Toffee. And I love the name of their rainbow sprinkle cupcake too, the Sprinklicious cupcake.
I had a really tough decision to make and not a lot of time because I had a plane to catch. 

I ended up going with the Raspberry Chocolate cupcake because: 

1. I've only reviewed a vegan Raspberry Chocolate cupcake 

2. raspberry is a summer time fruit and Summer is almost over 

3. A fresh raspberry sits on top of the raspberry frosting of Hotcakes Bakes' Raspberry cupcake which I personally have never seen on that flavor cupcake before. 

Raspberry cupcake from Hotcakes Bakes
photo by Nikki DeMartini 

They asked if we wanted a napkin to eat our selections right then or if we'd like them to go and my Dad and I got ours to go. They have individual plastic cupcake to go containers which are just perfect, not to mention genius. I can't tell you how many times frosting has been smeared and even smashed because cupcakes get jostled around so much in a box.

 I got to the airport, got through security, got to my gate and then I got to enjoy my cupcake. 

I had to eat some of the frosting before I could take a full bite of the cupcake because it was stacked so high. I hadn't noticed it at first but along with the fresh raspberry on top there was also fresh raspberries mixed into the frosting! 

It's consistency wasn't quite whipped...it was creamy yet light and not too sweet with a hint of tart raspberry. The chocolate cake was fresh but not very chocolatey. It was a little on the dry side but bites with both cake and frosting took care of that. If the cake was super buttery or moist I think it would have been an overload with the frosting. Something else I didn't notice at first was the hard shell of chocolate right under the pile of frosting which I don't think was special to this flavor. Maybe it's there to help keep the high frosting in place? I'm not sure but it was a tasty little surprise. 

Raspberry cupcake from Hotcakes Bakes
photo by Nikki DeMartini 

The Raspberry Chocolate cupcake from Hotcakes Bakes was a great afternoon treat that wasn't too sweet and it traveled well. I was one satisfied passenger and I will definitely go back there for more cupcakes next time I visit LA. Thanks for the great recommendation Dad!