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I had actually been very curious about Cupcakes by Sonja for quite a few months now — thanks to a couple of my friends’ photos of the baked goodies — but I had never gotten around to appeasing my curiosity. Serendra, where Ms. Sonja’s quaint little shop can be found, was just too off-tangent from my daily work route. It was only earlier this afternoon that Nicco decided to road trip, which isn’t exactly saying much since we had just come from a friend’s house in Forbes.

Anyway, I texted my sister just to ask where Serendra is located. She texted back saying that it’s right across Market Market. Great. Neither Nicco nor I knew how to get there. (Nicco lives in Bel-Air, but our preferred mode of transportation are the trains. We both hate driving.) We ended up following a bunch of cars, hoping that one of them would take us to Serendra. We got there in one piece, fortunately. Thank goodness Cupcakes by Sonja was just near the entrance. You won’t miss it. If you’ve been blog-hopping or researching painstakingly about food obsessions like I do, you might have gotten wind of pictures of a nice little pink shop that looks like something out of a 50s movie.

I didn’t expect the queue to be long at that hour but it was. I would’ve preferred to go in the morning, since I can be assured that the batches of cupcakes would be freshly baked, but I’m not complaining. The choices all looked so good! I had to stop myself from ordering every piece. I contented myself with 6 kinds and was surprised to find that my bill amounted only to about PhP366. I was expecting to spend double that.

Sonja was actually there when we dropped by. She was talking to someone (a food writer/columnist perhaps?) although she herself handled my transaction. She was really nice and quite apologetic when she mentioned that they ran out of staple wires to keep my credit card receipt and their official receipt together. She then went back to her Macbook Pro. At that point, I was thinking, “Hey! She’s a Mac person! I like her already!” But I digress…

The cupcakes:

• Red Velvet Vixen – I was curious about the mixed reviews so I had to see for myself. Nicco found it “nakakasawa” (tiring) and I was expecting it to be a bit more red. I loved the cream, but the cupcake itself needs more density. It’s supposed to be made of Valrhona flourless chocolate, so I needed to taste what makes Valrhona special. Sadly, the chocolate taste wasn’t there.
• Vanilla Sunshine – Like the name says, it’s vanilla. And I don’t mean that in a good way. But Nicco thinks it’s a “happy cupcake,” so I can translate that as something you eat when you need comfort food.
• Strawberries and Cream – Probably the most expensive cupcake in my box. You can enjoy that nutty taste in your mouth and then you suddenly get hit by the berry at the end of it. Delicious! Nicco calls it the “fun cupcake.”
• Lemon Drop – This one I thoroughly enjoyed. I’ve always liked the crazy taste of lemon so having lemony icing over lemony cake is just heaven.
• Mint Condition – One of my favorites. I never realized how fun mint chocolate is until I’ve taken a bite of this. I’m not a chocolate lover so if a chocolate-flavored snack captures my attention, it means I’ve tasted something unusual. (I love chocolate-orange, too. Yes, I’m weird that way.)
• Bunny Huggers Carrot – My ultimate favorite. If I could hug a cupcake, this would be it. While the frosting on the rest of the cakes (save for Red Velvet Vixen) are grainy, this one has a smooth, melt-in-your-mouth consistency. I also went gaga over its denseness.

I don’t know if I’m satisfied just yet. Though half the goods in the box are yummy, the other half are so-so. Being the cake lover that I have always been, I know that I do have to go back and sample the rest of stuff in that shop.

Rating: 7/10