From these fleetingly hot days of summer in Upstate New York, I thought I’d take you on a getaway this week to go baking cupcakes in kitchens in foreign countries.  I’ve scouted out the bloggs for the best-looking cupcakes with photo instructions and recipes.

Summer Cupcakes

We start our tour with the cutest summer cupcakes on the planet!  How creative are these?  La Despensa Del Gnomo blog uses the universal image of the drink umbrella with fondants to create beach scenes, from towels to starfish to shovels.  The cupcakes are bottomed-off with palm tree wrappers.

Can any of our Spanish-speaking readers act as our translator tour guide?  One of the ingredients is that yum word “Nutella.”  But just how it fits into the cupcake is the question.

Do take a moment to click on her “cupcakes” category in the blog.  One of her recipes is for Papaya cupcakes – another great summer cupcake idea.  How fun to wander through foreign kitchens to bring their local flavors to our own!

Super Mario Cupcake by hello naomi

There’s nothing more classic geek than Super Mario Brothers.  I love how sharply detailed the iconic little characters turn out in fondant!

Amazing cupcakes and picture by ATC favorite and baker extraordinaire, hello naomi. Thanks to GeekSugar for the cupcake tip!

photo courtesy of CakeJournal

When I was tooling around CakeJournal‘s site after getting info about Louise’s cupcake needle felt pillows, I found her collection of cake decorating tutorials. This made me happy because it reminded me that the creation of fancy cupcake decorations are indeed within even my beginner’s grasp.

In my quest to find new and interesting cupcake news for ATC, I see the incredible craft and artistry that goes into decorating cupcakes and cakes. I’m always  impressed by the creativity of these pieces.  However,  most of the time  I can’t say that I find inspiration in them because it often looks like a level of composition and sculpture that’s well out of my league. I think that CakeJournal’s collection of tutorials is just the thing to bridge that gap.

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These veterinary-themed cupcakes come to us courtesy of a  grad party and Clever Cupcakes in Montreal. And to quote Clever Cupcakes flickr feed, “Yes, in case you are wondering that is a dissected fondant frog :)”

I feel like I really should just change this to “Clever Cupcakes Most Awesome Cupcake of the Week” since the Montreal-based cupcakery gets featured here so often.  But what can I say – they make great nerd-themed cupcakes.  Perhaps this will be a challenge to our readers and cupcake bakers the world over to make more nerdy cupcakes. And to send us the pictures :)