In The Orchard

On this hot summer day, free from work, I decided to take a little jaunt about 15 miles south of Buffalo to Orchard Park. The main reason for the trip: to get a cupcake!

The Cupcake Orchard is Orchard Park's gourmet cupcake bakery that offers everyday flavors as well as several monthly specials. Since July is National Ice Cream Month, the bakery had a couple ice cream inspired flavors: Root Beer Float and Neopolitan. I was intrigued by root beer but I'm not a fan of root beer in general. I was recommended the Neopolitan for its fresh strawberry flavor (I was even given the opportunity to pick out my wafer flavor!).  Each of their cupcakes is $2.50.

located at: 4174 North Buffalo Road, Orchard Park, New York

This cupcake was so inventive and tasty. It had the 3 layers that you would expect from Neopolitan ice cream: strawberry (frosting), vanilla and chocolate (cake). The frosting tasted very similar to fresh strawberry ice cream (of the Breyer's variety). The cake had a deep chocolate flavor that only comes from high quality ingredients. It was moist and all three flavors combined did take me back to my childhood when I consumed a lot of Neopolitan ice cream. This definitely is my favorite cupcake in Buffalo so far.

Also right across the street was a well-known restaurant of the Buffalo favorite Beef on Weck, except it was an express version of the restaurant. Charlie the Butcher was named the top Beef on Weck by Serious Eats and I thought since it was right there and I hadn't had lunch yet, I would get one, even if the Charlie the Butcher was inside a gas station. 

I was impressed that there was actually a carving station for the roast beef, which was sliced to order. And the guy who prepared my sandwich sliced the kimmelweck roll on the spot and also gave me the option to have the roll dipped in au jus (which I did). The fresh horseradish came on the side, so I could control the heat level. 

The meat was tender and juicy although a little lukewarm (I'll blame it on the fact that it came from a gas station). The roll was still too salty for me but I remedied that by scraping some salt off. The caraway seeds were sparse but the roll as soft with a little crunch from the browned top. I'm not yet a total fan of the sandwich but I did enjoy this one the most out of my other Beef on Weck encounters. However, I think I'll still stick with the Beef On Weck Pizza from Pearl Street Grill & Brewery.

On a side note: I didn't really want to eat both my Beef on Weck and cupcake in the gas station, so I found refuge at the nearby Panera for me to consume my goodies. I did purchase an iced green tea so I wasn't totally mooching on their space. Big Sista thought I was being a little ghetto.