World Cupcakes.

In order to celebrate our homecoming to the United States and the big World Cup game on Saturday, we decided to try something new.

First, it was such a treat to bake in a kitchen bigger than our tiny apartments! Just one of the many perks to being home in the summer.

To create the soccer ball, we arranged the cupcakes into a ball shape then frosted the tops together. The idea of this pull apart cake is to overfill the cups with batter so that they bake together when they rise. However, ours didn't exactly behave like they were supposed to. We made it work anyways...

Even though the U.S. lost, we're still glad to be back in the States baking!

We sincerely missed being in the kitchen while we were in Europe.

We will be back soon with more from our European adventures.

love love love

Aim and J

Czech us out!

While our experience in Prague may not have been ideal (marijuana hotel placed in between tattoo parlor and night club, dark hairs found in the sheets, no shower head), the food was definitely up to par.

Breakfast for dessert? Yes please! These were Lindsey and Nicole's pancakes with blueberry compote.
We opted for the maple banana crepes.

We were heading back to our hotel after dinner, but were literally stopped dead in our tracks by this gelato shop.

There was a slight language and monetary barrier... but the end result was fantastic.

Many more to come!

Sausagefest.

One word sums up our German experience: Sausage.

Sausage, sausage, sausage.

Belgium.

Belgium was a close second to Paris as far as best food contest goes. Since we were only there for one night, we had no time to waste. So we decided to treat ourselves to a three course meal.

Course #1: Belgian Chocolate.

Insider Tip: If you ever find yourself in Brussels, its best to go into every chocolate shop you see. Most give free samples. End result: a dozen free chocolates.

Course #2: Belgian fries with andalouse sauce.

Course #3: Belgian waffles.

We wish we would have gone for the ice cream on top of the waffle option, but the homemade whip cream was not too shabby.

Paris, Je T'aime!

Bonjour Mademoiselles et Miseurs!

Are you familiar with the phrase "like kids in a candy shop" ? Well they're thinking about changing it to "like Aim and J in Paris". Neither of us are what you would call a "dieter", however, we try to limit the amount of sweets we consume in one sitting to a normal amount. But this city's culinary excellence forced us to leave all the rules at the train stop. Every single meal consisted of us sharing a small sandwich and then a few pastries. A very balanced diet. Our friend Lindsey said it best when she described our diet by saying she felt like a stuffed animal.

We could attempt to describe our experiences, but there aren't enough words to express what our taste buds tasted. We'll let the pictures do the talking:

Chocolate Meringue

Croque Monsieur (not a sweet, but we had to share this Parisienne delicacy)

We can't remember the name of this pastry but we like to call it a double decker eclair.

The double decker eclair pre-surgery

Kristie and her chocolate eclair
A strawberry tart

Ice cream cones from ice cream Le Ils de Glaces (Ice Cream Island).

Macaroons

This is where we got the macaroons, meringue, croque monsieur and double decker eclair. We like to think it's the Parisienne version of Carlo's Bakery.

Unfortunately we did not photograph every treat we ate. Just add a few pain du chocolats, eclairs, croissants and let your imagination do the rest.

Paris was good to us, stay tuned for more European treats!

xoxo

Aim and J

LONDON BABY!!

Cheers ladies and gents!

We apologize for the delay, but better late than never. Our first stop on our European journey was London.

London is known for their comfort foods such as bangers and mash, fish and chips and shepherds pie. Unfortunately these dishes aren't too sweet. But we did find some goodies at our favorite shopping plaza: Harrods. At Harrods, everything is extravagant. We like to refer to it as the Disneyland of department stores. What's even better, Harrods has a basement with chocolates, teas, coffees, and even a few restaurants. While we wandered through, we were in search of something sweet. J was in line for chocolate when Aim stopped dead in her tracks: CUPCAKES. Cupcakes in Harrods. J instantly asked the Harrods employee to put her chocolate back (obnoxious American) and ran to her first love.

Bliss

J's Lemon Cupcake

Aim's Oreo Cupcake

Salt, Birthdays, and Bon Voyage.

Ahh we meet again.

We've been busy, real busy, but baking doesn't take a rest. Finals took their toll but we still found time to make these chocolate, salted-caramel filled cupcakes. These weren't our best creations, but you live and learn.

We learned to be conservative when adding salt to something sweet like chocolate. This recipe had potential, but due to salt overdose, they never reached their prime. Oh, one good thing about these cups: their ganache frosting called for THREE sticks of butter. It was rich and tasty.

We would like to introduce you to someone very dear to our hearts:

Allison Rae Choco

We lost Allie to Spain the past semester but we're happy to say she's back again!

To celebrate her return and her birthday we decided to bake her a little something special. We decided to keep it simple with a yellow cake with a fudge frosting. It got a little runny, which made for difficulty with decorating, as you can see, but it tasted spectacular!

It was our friend Jake's birthday, too.

Now we are left in an awkward position. We have been presented with the opportunity to travel to Europe for 5 weeks which means we will not be baking during this time. However, we have a proposition to make. How do you feel about keeping up with all of the tasty pastries and various European sweets we try while overseas?

We're feelin pretty good!

See you in Europe! Our first stop: London.

xoxo