Butter Lane Cupcakes: the best cupcakes in NYC?

Butter Lane Cupcakes

It’s been almost two years now since Butter Lane Cupcakes added their icinged-up little beauties to the East Village block (7th Street between First and A) that’s become somewhat renowned for its eateries of focused excellence, from the roasted pork sandwiches at Porchetta and lobster rolls at Luke’s to the ceviche at Desnuda and the arepas at Caracas, to name just a few. And Butter Lane fits right in. All they sell here are cupcakes (and Stumptown coffee), top-notch, mix-n-match treats that are perfect for a sweet afternoon refueling snack, for dessert after any of the above-mentioned 7th Street cheap eats, or in a to-go box, to bring home and make your friends and family love you. And if you can’t get to the East Village, Butter Lane has a terrific website, with easy-online ordering and delivery to anywhere in Manhattan. 

 

Butter Lane Cupcakes

We dropped by Butter Lane the other evening for a post-pizza treat and were rewarded, as always, with a couple of bites of pure deliciousness. The Cherry-iced Vanilla Cake tasted of real fruit, the cake maybe a bit more cake-y than we usually like (it’s not as moist as Sugar Sweet Sunshine’s recipe, nor as dense as Magnolia’s), but fresh and authentically vanilla all the same. The Salted Caramel on top of Chocolate Cake was excellent, the thick, rich, and sweet icing complementing the cocoa-y chocolate cake. These cupcakes are bit pricey for their size–$3 for one, $16 for six–but they definitely don’t skimp on the pure ingredients here.  

 

Butter Lane Cupcakes

One of the things we like most about Butter Lane is all of the choices. There are usually around 20 different kinds of icing available (all buttercream, either French or American style, and, so far as we’ve tried, all good), including standbys such as cream cheese, coconut, strawberry, and chocolate raspberry as well as more unusual flavors, like grapefruit ginger, peanut butter, maple pecan, and honey cinnamon. These icings you can pair with one of three cake flavors, usually chocolate, vanilla, or banana (the latter, by the way, perfect with that peanut butter topping). The nice added touch, especially if you make Butter Lane the dessert you bring to a party when you say “I’ll bring dessert”? A bit of garnish–a cherry, some popcorn, candied lime peel, a sprinkling of spice, a couple of pecans–that makes it all just a bit more special and festive. 

 

Butter Lane Cupcakes

Butter Lane Cupcakes details 

Butter Lane Cupcakes is located on 7th Street between First Avenue and Avenue A, and is open on Sunday and Monday from 11:00 a.m. until 10:00 p.m., on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday until 11:00 p.m., and on Friday and Saturday until midnight. For more information–about the cakes, about their catering, about their on-site baking classes (!)–and to order online, please see the Butter Lane website, here. 

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