The Perfect Circle Cupcakery

After weeks of trying to arrange a birthday party for our daughter we have given up. At least five attempts to come by during posted business hours to give them a deposit and make the arrangements and no one is ever there. No voicemail; phone just rings morning, afternoon & night. No responses to social media posts — in what world can you run a business like this??? One phone call and a competitor happily took our money and our business.

Closed when they had 2 «open» signs and we came an hour after opening hours but shop was definitely closed!

The place is super cute. I love cupcakes! I’ve been here a few times, but today was reminded why I don’t care too much for their cupcakes. Perhaps it’s the end of the day? 330pm and they didn’t taste fresh. I ordered a Red Velvet Cupcake. The cream cheese frosting is delicious. the cupcake it self tasted dry.

One sweet treat that I absolutely LOVE are cupcakes. So anytime I find a new cupcake place to try I am always up for it :) Upon walking it, I felt like the whole place could use a little energy boost. The person at the counter literally just looked at us when it was our turn to place our order, no hi no anything. I also did not like that for the life of me I could not find a price anywhere for these cupcakes !! I had to ask. We ended up purchasing six and taking them to go so we could pick them apart and sample them later. Not much flavor to the actual cake part over all and too much frosting for the amount of cake per cupcake. I am glad I have tried them but not entirely thrilled. On to the next :)

If you walk in the store and get a cupcake, they are great. However… if you are catering a party, try to find another place. When we picked up for the party, it seemed they were rushed to get them done and iced them while they were still warm. The icing didn’t have time to set and they are not boxed in cupcake hole carriers so all the cupcakes tipped over. My pick up person was EXTREMELY CAREFUL but they were so soft that they were ruined. They all fell over on each other and since the icing wasn’t set it came off on about ½ of my order, which wasn’t cheap! I had to try and gather the icing and re-​spread it to make them look somewhat presentable. My advice to them is Splurge on the cardboard piece that goes inside the box with holes in it to hold the cupcakes upright so no one has to go through this again. I spent a lot of money for terrible looking cupcakes

3.6
Pro: Consistently great tasting cupcakes.
Cute décor.
Priced appropriately.
Con: Inconsistent hours of operation, closed randomly.
Cleanliness (floors, etc), not good.
Not well stocked with miscellany (ice cream, beverages)
Summary: The quality of the cupcakes and the location (Old Towne) are why she stays in business. Seems like the owner is a skilled baker, but mediocre at best as a business owner.
If she maintained reliable hours and made her employees clean, this would be 5 stars.

We were watching CupCake Wars and we came across the city of Orange. So cute place. All my favorite colors. black hahaha .
The cupcakes are so cute and delicious. For sure going to be my Cupcake place.

I stopped by the orange circle and had several people recommend this cupcake place to me. I got 2 banana bomb and 1 24 karrot gold! My favorite was hands down the banana one, not a fan of banana at all and I loved the cupcake! The frosting itself was amazing too. Highly recommend that cupcake if it’s your first time.

The best cupcakes we ever have ate. What fun to sit there and share the different award winning cakes. After sharing one, we kept going back for more and then took another dozen home for dessert after dinner with the whole family.

Ever since seeing The Perfect Circle Cupcakery on Cupcake Wars, I’ve wanted to try their cupcakes!
The banana cupcake — which was my favorite — was as moist and delicious as fresh banana bread with the addition of smooth, creamy frosting on top. The sprinkle of nuts over the frosting added the perfect crunch to the otherwise smooth texture! I would definitely get banana again.
The chocolate cupcake was also moist and the rich chocolate flavor was perfect for any chocoholic like my boyfriend! I liked the frosting but my favorite part of this cupcake was the cute little mini chocolate chips atop the frosting! Again the chocolate chips added a nice mouthfeel to the otherwise smooth cake.
The prices are pretty standard for baking shop cupcakes. The quality warrants the price in my opinion.
We will definitely return to try more flavors!

What do Casey’s Cupcakes and The Perfect Circle Cupcakery have in common? They both won «Cupcake Wars!»
Alyssa Magliato first appearance on «Cupcake Wars» didn’t end «perfect» and one judge accused her of playing it safe. When she was given a chance to come back three years later, she pushed herself with cupcake flavors like pulled-​pork slider inside of a vanilla cupcake and chocolate vodka raspberry to take home the top prize.
Rohlinism: If at first you don’t succeed, try pork and alcohol!
The better half and I arrived fashionably early to an Alphabet dinner event and decided to kill some time walking around The Orange Circle. The window display (
) was the first thing that caught my eye and the interesting interior (
) convinced me to come in and take a look around. The store signage (
) fits the décor, but it is really about the cupcakes isn’t it?
Walking in, we were greeted by the young woman working about the counter and she answered all our questions regarding the names /​flavors of the cupcakes:
(
)
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)
Outside of the names (and the Caramel Bordeaux), the flavors weren’t very interesting on my visit. The Banana Bomb (one of the flavors they are known for) was missing from the display case, so either it was sold out or it was out the rotation.
The woman in front of me bought out the four remaining «The Princess» cupcakes (Vanilla) for her daughter (maybe the princess was going to share with the «peasants in her kingdom) and being the end of the business day, the amount of cupcakes was somewhat limited. Like most cupcake shops, I believe the flavors rotate, but I don’t have any information on what the regular flavors are, but I would assume The Queen Red Velvet (Southern light cocoa cake, cream cheese frosting lightly dusted with red velvet cake), The King Chocolate (Valrhona dark chocolate cake with valrhona dark chocolate buttercream frosting covered in bittersweet chocolate chips) and Princess Vanilla (Pure Madagascar vanilla coke with your choice of white or Tiffany blue rich vanilla buttercream frosting) are probably among the regulars with other flavors being changed on a regular basis. The pricing seems to be standard ($ 3.50 per cupcake) for a cupcake shop.
After some debate, I finally selected two cupcakes (
) which were boxed up for me, snapped some pics for Unilocal and headed back to our Alphabet dinner.
After dinner, I went home and dug into my recently purchased treats. The Buttercup (Peanut butter chocolate chip cake with dark chocolate frosting and peanut butter cup piece on top) had a really nice flavor from the frosting, but the cake itself was rather dry and basically crumbed into my lap as a bit in. I felt the flavors were balanced and I could taste the harmony of peanut butter and chocolate. The Caramel Bordeaux (Dark chocolate cake and frosting with caramel in the middle and chopped nuts on top) had an equally dry cake, but again the frosting and harmony of flavors was really good.
If you are in Orange craving cupcakes, this place is worth a try.

Have been going here for our cupcakes for quite awhile, but I think I will have to find a new place for my perfect cupcakes! The last two times I went there to pick up cupcakes for an event, they were closed. I ended up having to pick up cookies at a grocery store instead and they were terrible. It seems like they pick and choose when they want to be open, and if you are going to post hours, I would stick to those unless of course emergency. They have tasty cupcakes, but then again, they are not like they were a couple of years ago. If you are downtown Orange, and they are open, it is a nice treat for dessert… I would always call ahead if you are driving there!

This place possesses the most scrumptious cupcakes in Orange County. If not Orange County, THE UNIVERSE! This place a has a great feel to it. Occasionally, a handsome, well-​groomed Mexican looking guy will come in and his presence brings a vast amount of joy into the store. He has a great smile and awesome hair. He’s also Big Sandy’s nephew. This young mans name is Jared Williams (me)!!
On a serious note, I do think these cupcakes are amazing. You will be satisfied with anyone get. My personal favorite is the the tuxedo cupcake with cream cheese frosting! The Perfect Circle Cupcakery has also been featured on cupcake wars, in which they won! Their best-​selling cupcake is the Red Velvet. If Unilocal had 10 stars to rate, I’d give it 1,000.

Hours say 12 – 5, showed up at 2 to find a handwritten closed sign on the door. :(
No cupcakes for us. Don’t think we will make the effort to come back.

First off, paying close to 4 bucks for a bakery cupcake doesn’t surprised me. So I’m not taking cost into consideration but I noticed it was bothersome to other reviewers. I have been here 3 or 4 times recently. I have tried the red velvet (of course) peanut butter, black & white, and coconut (both regular & strawberry) and honestly they were all good.
My biggest pet peeve about bakeries is when I get a goodie that has obviously been sitting on the shelf for a few days & it has that stale old dry flavor. Not this place. They make everything fresh in the morning. That’s probably why they don’t always have a full load of cupcakes available… because they only make enough for a days sale. So expect moist homemade cupcakes. Much better than grocery store cupcakes!
Anyways, I will go back & try more. They’re not quite as delectable as Sprinkles but still a nice after-​dinner treat. Worth 4 bucks.

Thumbs down on the red velvet. Good cream cheese frosting, but the actual cake was dry and dull in color.

We took a weekend afternoon stroll around the circle absorbing everything old towne about it. We ended up I’m front of this little cupcake joint and fell in love with the décor and the amazing cupcakes.
SUPER CUTE and a lovely place to take a gal out to for dessert. JUST a heads up: do it early as the sell out of cupcakes mid afternoon.

Have lived in Orange for 20 yrs and love old town Orange. Usually buy cupcakes at French’s bakery on Tustin Ave.
Wanted to try these! Bought 6 flavors. All were terribly stale and dry with really unpleasant frosting taste and texture.
CAN’T believe they would serve these.
I thought it was odd that they only had one or two flavors in the display. But said they have plenty in back. Boxed and took home.
I would have been very embarrassed to serve these to anyone. Luckily I ate one as again. wanted to try them.
I will be contacting the owner. Really surprised how bad.

Tried the cupcakes here during the Orange International Fair. 3 mini cupcakes for $ 5 — I tried the Red Velvet, 24 Carrot and the Buttercup. They were pretty good — also very sweet but what cupcake isn’t?
I don’t know how good the other flavors were but when it comes to cupcakes I only usually like a few flavors. These were pretty moist and tasty and I think mini cupcakes are the best because it’s not too heavy and you can eat like one or two more different flavors.
There’s really no service I can speak of — they basically put out all the flavors and pick it out and they give to you… and that was it.
Don’t know if I’ll go out of my way to get them cupcakes though… I mean they weren’t like super special — it was just convenient to get them when I was there.

Only 2 stars for having a Cupcake Wars reputation?! I’ve got to come in and try it for myself… Now, getting here on a weekday after work hours can be a little hectic + frustrating. Parking is only on the streets like on Glassell for 2 hours, or on Maple for only 1 hour. I was lucky to find a spot that opened up right away, because if I had to drive around that busy Chapman Ave. area, those cupcakes had better be worth it!
BUT since I didn’t have any trouble finding parking… I was in a pretty good mood as I made my way to the store.
This little shop is to the right side of the circle (the 1^st right) if you’re coming from Chapman Ave. on the 5 fwy or 55 fwy. However, if I may make a suggestion… I suggest avoiding Chapman Ave. & the Orange Circle. and come from the other side, from Maple St. Maybe turn on Grand St. from Chapman, and turn on Maple Ave. That will avoid all the CA drivers who don’t know how to properly use the traffic circle. haha.
Ok. sorry for my rant. Onto the actual store.
I walked up to the store, and it reminded me of Queen’s Bakery in Costa Mesa on Grace Ln. White & Black stripes are their color theme. (If it’s a bit thicker stripe, it would remind me of «Beetlejuice». hahaha.)
Anyways, came here on Tuesday afternoon, 3pm, and it was very empty. Only 2 ladies were sitting against the wall enjoying their cupcakes. I walked in and was soon greeted by what seemed like a friendly young man.
After browsing through their minimal selections, I was ready to order. I noticed that some of their popular flavors were almost sold out: Lemon, Vanilla, Tuxedo. But I was surprised to see other ones plenty left like Red Velvet, Carrot, Banana, Coconut, Old-​Fashioned, and Buttercup. Snickerdoodle & Chocolate Peppermint are the seasonal flavors. (Now a short comment about Coconut: The only coconut thing about it is the coconut flakes. Otherwise, it’s a vanilla cupcake with cream cheese frosting.)
I wasn’t too impressed about their flavors. Nothing special or creative like other cupcake flavors I’ve seen like: «Obama-​nation» or «Maple Bacon» or «Raspberry Champagne».
Now, I was peeved that the employee behind the counter wasn’t giving me his full attention. There was another customer that he was chatting up with and I think trying to flirt with. So, while I was making my selections and he was taking the cupcakes out, he would continue his conversation with the other person. I started to get a little annoyed because I wanted to ask some q’s about the cupcake flavors and I couldn’t get his attention. But since he continued to ignore multiple times, I didn’t want to ask him for his opinion anymore. There were a few times when I asked, but he flat out ignored me. For this I am taking off 1.5 stars for poor, inattentive customer service.
BUT during check out, the guy gave me a $ 0.50 discount bc I only had a $ 10 bill, when it was really $ 10.50. So, for that I give back +0.5 star! :)
Ok, the other star I took off was just for the flavors. There wasn’t anything interesting about it. Plus it’s a bit dry. I think the frosting part is a little too much for the rest of the cake. It’s at least 2 – 2.5″ high. I’m not a huge fan of frosting and it’s a bit deceiving bc the cupcakes looks bigger than it really is because the frosting takes up about half of its size. Each cupcake is $ 3 each.
Overall, you’re probably not getting your money’s worth plus having to fight the traffic to get here… I wouldn’t waste your time + energy to buy their cupcakes. Sorry…