Cupcakes!

[matgb]

Jennie and I are having our first argument. I think it's a northern thing, but we will solve it with skience:
[Poll #1069303]
Because, seriously, although we're giggling, this is the first time we've seriously disagreed.
ETA: Despite quite blatantly losing this vote, she's now making excuses—the votes of Americans and Southerners don't, apparently, count. OK, currently still winnning anyway :-D

Comments

[cosmolinguist]

seriously, although we're giggling, this is the first time we've seriously disagreed.

I'm pretty sure the first time Andrew and I seriously disagreed was about spelling (and then pronunciation).

[matgb]

On spelling, you're right, it's arbitrary. But Webster's version of arbitrary is weird, at least ours is just common practice. Personally I theoretically care not as long as comprehension is there, but in practice bad spelling gets to me in a visceral manner.

I can deal with American, as long as it's acknowledged it's not English, it's a dialect...

On pronunciation? You're just wrong. I actually avoid listening to my US friends phone-posts at times, for some reason it always gests to me :-(

[miss-s-b.livejournal.com]

You neglect to recall your liberal principles, darling. Just because a majority agree des not make them right. I will take you to the bakery tomorrow and see how far it gets you asking for a bloody cupcake.

[andrewducker]

Depends on whether your definitions are descriptive or prescriptive...

My "Something else" vote

[strangefrontier.livejournal.com]

To me, cupcakes and buns are generally interchangeable words. Sometimes bun tends to describe plain, un-iced varieties and cupcakes are decorated, but I use the word bun more often and I consider both buns and cupcakes to be cakes.

Re: My "Something else" vote

[matgb]

There's always one. To be honest, up until now I'd not really tried to define what a 'bun' is, I've always known what cake is, but not buns...

[nadriel.livejournal.com]

I'm a Northerner- therefore my well-thought out reply counts?

[matgb]

But Mike, you voted for Guido. This is, I admit, a valid vote, and it means she's in last place on the voting score, but, y'know...

[rho]

To my mind, a bun is either an alternative word for a bap or barm, or is something along the lines of a hot cross bun. A cupcake, on the other hand, is more akin to a muffin. If I had to put my finger on the difference, I'd probably say something about the internal texture, and the shape of air bubbles, and what have you.

And I am, of course, a born and bred northerner, though I don't doubt she'll argue I'm from the wrong side of the Penines.

[matgb]

Your definition is fairly close to mine. I'm waiting for the other Yorksher folk on the friends list to vote, so far we're one-all on that score.

[tiredstars.livejournal.com]

[matgb]

Cake!

[innerbrat]

*confused*

But buns are made of bread, and cupcakes are made of cake.

...what is Jennie thinking of?

[miss-s-b.livejournal.com]

Buns are defined by size, not constituent parts. Buns are small baked things, whatever they are made of. You can get bread buns and cake buns but they are all buns.

[burkesworks.livejournal.com]

Cupcakes are by definition cakes; but an eccles cake is a bun, and a teacake or a barm cake is neither.

[matgb]

Thank you, I think. Eccles cakes are a pastry/bread style thing, which is what buns are.

[missdiane.livejournal.com]

Oxford and other dictionaries define it as a small cake baked in a cup *shrug*

Although I guess it's my American perception that a "bun" would would be a different texture than a cake/cupcake - as in bread or pastry-like in texture and more often using yeast?

[matgb]

I guess it's my American perception that a "bun" would would be a different texture than a cake/cupcake - as in bread or pastry-like in texture

Not an American perception, I think it's just the Yorksher loon.

[eldar.livejournal.com]

Oh my. I voted "Other" because I reckoned the best way to do this is to say what I know of as a cupcake. And being a southerner married to an American... well.

A cupcake is a small cake/bun, usually quite light in texture, that is presented in a dainty little paper holder called a "cup".

Oh dear, but I've used both "cake" and "bun". Well, it's a cake because, well, it uses cake mixture. But it's a bun because it's bun-sized. But my Nan's buns never came in little paper holders. So they're not really buns. They're cakes. But they're bun-sized. And so goes the circle of semi-inebriated logic.

[matgb]

Smartarse. Linguistic circles help no one y'know.

I disagree with the "bun sized" thing, but that's the reationale she's using.

[yuxonomei.livejournal.com]

I always thought that a cupcake was American for fairy cake.

Nigella says they are cakes, as does Delia. I'm going with them for they know cake.

[matgb]

I've always thought fairy cakes and cup cakes were slightly different things, cup cakes have a sort of fruit-icing, whereas fairy cakes are more creamy, but that's just what my Granny did with them.

[waka-laka.livejournal.com]

I MEANT CAKE. sdfhsdf

[foxfirefey]

You can change your vote!

[eccles.livejournal.com]

I hope you kept the receipt for that ring!

[miss-s-b.livejournal.com]

The one that *I* paid for? LOL

[caseytalk.livejournal.com]

The only difference between a cup cake and a regular cake is the size. The photo posted above illustrates that. It is a cup cake.

A bun is more bread-like.

Matb -- those of us who have known jennie for many years know she will never admit a mistake tied to language. I've found the solution to be to nod and smile and say, "yes, of course you're right" and go on using the word correctly as before.

[matgb]

On the first point, I concur. On the latter? I'll use an icon I stole from her before we met.

[silentgreeneyes.livejournal.com]

buns are indeed more bread based, contain yeast, and not usually baked in 'cups' or paper cases.
Cupcakes are, by definition, cakes. They're similar to muffins, but the mix used to make them. Muffins tend to use an oilier batter rather than basic self raising flour + sugar+ egg + butter mix.

[matgb]

Jennie thinks the term muffin is used to describe cup cakes to stop this sort of argument, we all know muffin is an americanism.

But I reckon you're right.

[freddiefraggles.livejournal.com]

A cup cake is American for fairy cake, as far as I'm concerned.

Mmmcake.

[matgb]

See above. I'm not sure I agree.

[pmoodie.livejournal.com]

I'd have said it was a small cake in a paper cup. After all, the clue is in the name, isn't it?

However, I am far from being an expert on such matters so I'll acept that I could be talking out of my cake-hole!

Anyway, it's good that your first real argument is about something so crucially important to the future of your relationship! :P

[matgb]

Well, it's not really the first real argument, it's the first one we haven't resolved. Because it appears to be some weird Yorkshire thing.

[mapp.livejournal.com]

Cupcake! Cupcake!

[ginasketch.livejournal.com]

who the fuck calls a cupcake a bun???

[matgb]

Jennie. She's quite insistent on the subject. So much so you can expect a post of the local cake shop display upcoming...

[andrewducker]

If it was 10" across then it would be clearly a cake.

A bun is a pastry item of some kind.

[matgb]

Precisely. Weird Yorkshire types.

[caseytalk.livejournal.com]

I continue to be impressed at your belief that there is only one correct way to speak English and that it is whatever is spoken in Yorkshire.

Here is what the OED has to say about cupcake:

"cupcake

• noun a small iced cake baked in a cup-shaped foil or paper container."

When a usage is strictly one used in N. Amer, the OED cites it. In this instance, there is no such citation.

You may wish to believe I do not speak English simply because I wasn't born in Yorkshire, but I assure you I do.

[miss-s-b.livejournal.com]

OK, but what does the OED have to say about "bun"? Because my argument is, was, and always has been, that a cupcake is a TYPE OF BUN and I see nothing there to contradict that.

[elethe.livejournal.com]

Followed eldar's link here.

While I have never heard a cupcake or small cake being called a bun it seems that there is a possibility you can call it a bun rather than a cake if you really want to - The Oxford University Press (http://www.answers.com/topic/bun?cat=health) says so (Sweetened bread roll; correctly made with yeast dough, although sometimes applied to small cakes made with baking powder, or to cream buns, which are made with choux pastry. )

That's the trouble with language - so many people use different words to mean the same thing and the same words to mean different things!

[matgb]

the same words to mean different things

That's the real problem, saying one thing, being perfectly clear, and everyone else thinking you're daft because of weird local dialect stuff. Apparently a bun is a small cake, and if you call a small cake a cake they'll look at you confused because cakes are large...

[arosoff.livejournal.com]

A cupcake is a cake. It is made from exactly the same batter you use to make cakes.

A bun is similar in shape, but is made from a different batter, and is less rich and less sweet. Ditto American muffins, which are baked in exactly the same tins as cupcakes, but are not the same thing at all.

Would you put icing/frosting on it? If you would, it's no bun, it's a cake.

Cupcakes came to be because of temperamental ovens. They were literally baked in cups, and baked more evenly than full sized cakes. Muffins and buns are quick breads.

[matgb]

Would you put icing/frosting on it? If you would, it's no bun, it's a cake.

See, that doesn't work either, because my bakery in Paignton did a great line of iced buns, lovely they were.

But, y'knoe, lots of little linguistic differences are fun.

[eldar.livejournal.com]

This is impressive. I've nothing new to say, I'm just trying to help push the comment count towards triple digits!

[matgb]

Nutcase. It is amusing in a way though.

I'm with her on this..

[ross.livejournal.com]

**Of course** Americans and Southerners don't count; they call Dinner 'lunch' and Tea 'dinner'. You just can't take that seriously. I mean, it's a mental handicap isn't it?

Meanwhile... - at least the quality of my gureilla-spam is interesting:-
the_intrepidfox