Sweet Rose Bakeshop — Restaurant in Purcellville

We've been going to Sweet Rose since about the time they opened and have enjoyed many birthday cakes and cupcakes for my son's class and other goodies these past few years. They custom made my son's birthday cake in December, precisely matching the "monster" theme of the decorations my wife had found. That cake was AMAZING and boy it did not last long... This weekend was my birthday, and my wife stopped in and bought a cake for our little celebration at home. I saw the Sweet Rose sticker on the box and smiled - this was going to be good! But, it wasn't. And I really hate to say that. It was sold as a chocolate cake with vanilla icing... I have no idea what happened, but my birthday cake was very disappointing. The cake itself was very bready, almost a little 'tough', and it did not taste very good or even chocolately. The icing also had a funny taste, and it did not stick to the cake - it just came off cleanly in large chunks, which was kind of weird. I don't mean to pile on and I'm not trying to cast aspersions, but I'm just really surprised and very disappointed with this cake. I almost feel like this was a special made cake for someone with dietary restrictions, like gluten free, or maybe even vegan (if that's something they even do, I don't know) and we somehow wound up with it by mistake. It's just not what we've come to expect from Sweet Rose. Unfortunately my wife isn't the kind of person to complain about something she purchased that doesn't meet expectations, but a birthday only comes around once a year. I really hope this was...

This place is under new ownership and it shows. We went on a Saturday late morning, a time one would expect a bakery to be busy and plan accordingly but they had very little on offer. The lovely young man working said that’s the normal range of options. All the pictures of gorgeous delicious items must be from the previous owners because the cases held nothing even close.

We got a cookie sandwich and a “scone”. The cookie was inedible because it was just sugar, no flavor in the cookie or the sugar fluff filling. That went in the trash before we got back to the car.

Then there was the “scone”. Whoever made this has clearly never actually SEEN a scone. If one is selling baked goods, one might want to actually know what these baked goods are. This was not a scone (fluffy/dense/slightly sweet/crisp on the outside). This was an underbaked/over-sweet cookie. Even for a cookie it was inedible. This too went in the trash after the picture.

SO disappointing. They won’t last long if this is the level of quality the new owners...

I will hand it to this bakery that their items are delicious. However! They were doing the cupcakes, cake and cookies for my wedding and the communication was so awful we had to come up with a back up plan just Incase they did not actually make my order.. thankfully they did and my father in law was able to pick them up the night before the wedding. However, up until that night I had no clue what was going on... talk about STRESSFUL. Then, this is now my 2 year anniversary and my husband and I wanted to get cupcakes like what we had at our wedding... the person corosponding with me via email (or lack of) basically just never got back to me and that was that. Sooooo here I am, anniversary, no cupcakes. It's a shame that the communication is this awful because the bakery makes delicious baked goods. Kind of hard to order when you can't get ahold...