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Aimee France, maker of artfully bumpy and leaning cakes<\/a> with ingredients like Earl Grey, calendula, and cognac\u2013tonka bean buttercream, didn\u2019t necessarily expect to become a full-time baker. But when COVID interrupted her college semester, she ended up back at her parents\u2019 house, where she taught herself how to bake. \u201cWhen I graduated in 2021, my parents were like, \u2018All right, Aimee, time to get a job,\u2019\u201d she says. \u201cAnd I said, \u2018Okay, listen: I think I could start a business.\u2019\u201d Clearly, word has spread; she baked Chlo\u00eb Sevigny<\/a> and Karen Elson<\/a>\u2019s wedding cakes, and her creations show up regularly at events around the city. She\u2019s also grown a social-media following \u2014 231,000 on Instagram alone \u2014 for her meticulous eating habits and elaborate breakfasts, which involve seasonal ingredients and specialty foods of the sort you might find at your local shoppy shop<\/a>. This week, France had some time off from baking, which she used to visit her parents for Easter, sing karaoke in Flushing, and devise a deviled-egg flight.<\/p>\n Tuesday, April 22<\/strong> I\u2019ve had this breakfast obsession all April: Greek yogurt from a farm in northern New Hampshire called Brookford Farm<\/a>. It\u2019s the best Greek yogurt I\u2019ve ever had \u2014 super-delicious and creamy, and not too tangy or acidic. It also has what I guess could be considered a barnyard-y flavor \u2014 you know when you smell something and can kind of taste it? It kind of tastes like how a farm smells, but not in a bad way. I add walnuts and some local honey.<\/p>\n I always have to have something fresh on the side, and lately, that\u2019s been a fig, a date, and a kiwi. Then I add a jammy egg on the side. I have what I call a three-drink minimum at breakfast: Usually that means an herbal tea \u2014 rosemary this time \u2014 a coffee, and a juice (or sometimes, like today, coconut water). I\u2019m really into Americanos right now with just a little bit of honey to break the acidity, but not enough to make it sweet.<\/p>\n I go on a long walk after breakfast, and suddenly it\u2019s time for lunch. The night before, I made Guinness-battered fish-filet sandwiches with haddock, and we have a few filets left over. I crisp the fish and put it in an asparagus-fennel salad tossed with tarragon-mustard dressing; I also make a tartar sauce and a warm baguette with salted butter. Afterward, I want a sweet snack and more caffeine, so I have a date filled with smoked cheddar, a Lindt chocolate chick from Easter, and a coconut-water matcha.<\/p>\n The caffeine was needed for a bike ride I\u2019m taking after lunch with my dad on a rail trail \u2014 it used to be a railroad track \u2014 that goes into Massachusetts. My dad takes biking really seriously: He has a whole outfit. He bikes like he\u2019s training for the Tour de France, and I\u2019m always far behind him. It\u2019s really fun.<\/p>\n Back home, we start thinking about dinner. My dad got a new grill that he\u2019s obsessed with, so I douse some local salmon in a maple tamari and Calabrian chile marinade and throw it on there. He also has a rotisserie appliance, which I use to get some Japanese sweet potatoes super-creamy. I make an asparagus, avocado, and sugar-snap-pea salad with tarragon vinaigrette on the side. A very nice last day.<\/p>\n Wednesday, April 23<\/strong> As a cook, I\u2019m completely self-taught. I have vivid memories of playing Iron Chef America with my friends as a child. We would make things out of random ingredients from my parents\u2019 kitchen and then \u201cjudge\u201d each other. I went vegan in high school, and that was a turning point because my mom was like, \u201cI\u2019m not cooking a separate meal for you every night.\u201d As a result, I started cooking most of my own food. I\u2019m not vegan anymore, but it was a learning experience, and it really made me appreciate produce.<\/p>\n My train gets canceled, and the next one isn\u2019t for a few hours. For lunch, because my parents\u2019 fridge is running low, I eat a variation of breakfast: baguette with blackberry jam and salted butter, some Moon Drop grapes, an apple, and walnuts. I go on a walk and sit outside with a Coca-Cola. I have a stomachache, and my parents insist this will help settle it. Plus, my dad is obsessed with Costco and he buys those huge flats of soda.<\/p>\n I\u2019m trying to hydration-max, so on the way to the train station, I buy a lemon-mint tea from a place called Pressed Caf\u00e9<\/a>. It\u2019s the only fast-casual chain spot in New Hampshire, and people are kind of obsessed with it. I also get a smoothie: spinach, kale, avocado, banana, almonds, cinnamon, flaxseed, almond milk, and almond butter, and I ask for extra mint. As I\u2019m drinking my green smoothie, the man next to me on the train pulls out this beautiful focaccia and prosciutto sandwich, and I\u2019m like, Oh my God, I hate my life right now. I get back to Brooklyn really late and collapse into bed.<\/p>\n Thursday, April 24<\/strong> Baking became a part of my life during COVID. I went home to New Hampshire for my birthday the day before the world began to shut down, and I ended up staying there for a very long time. Since regular internships weren\u2019t happening that summer, I decided I was going to create my own and try to teach myself everything about baking. I gained a following on Instagram, and when it was safe to come back to New York, I thought, Maybe I should try to sell my baked goods. I bought a table at the Hester Street Fair for a pop-up, and it sold out. So did my next one.<\/p>\n For breakfast, I have Greek yogurt with a nut mix \u2014\u00a0pecans, pistachios, and almonds \u2014\u00a0and this really delicious, thick honey that I brought back from a trip to Italy, where I did an art residency in a little lake town earlier this year. I add some honeycrisp apple, a date, and a jammy egg on the side like usual, plus an Americano, green juice, and lavender tea. I\u2019ve been really into lavender tea lately; I make it by steeping lavender buds.<\/p>\n Lunch is a fridge, freezer, and pantry clean-out moment. I have some fresh lumache, a small, shell-shaped pasta, in the freezer, so I make a pasta salad with that. I just recently got Hailee Catalano\u2019s cookbook<\/a>, and for Easter in New Hampshire, I made a ton of her recipes, including a huge batch of her caponata, a chopped eggplant dish. I froze some and brought it back to New York, and I use it in the pasta salad. I add some carrot, fennel, olives, dried oregano, and this super stagionato \u2014 mature \u2014 cheese that\u2019s basically like really aged, nutty Parmesan; I brought that back from Italy as well. Then I throw in Pecorino and Castelvetrano olives, and I top it with Fishwife hot-pepper sardines.<\/p>\n Later in the day, I have a photo shoot for my friend\u2019s clothing brand, Buci<\/a>. We eat some blueberries as a snack. Afterwards, since I\u2019m in Soho, I go to Happier Grocery<\/a>. They have a great prepared-food selection \u2014 I always get cooked proteins from there so I can just add them to whatever vegetables I have at home. I end up buying chicken tenders, a piece of salmon, and this green romesco sauce that is so good. I\u2019ve repurchased it probably five times at this point.<\/p>\n I get home kind of late, and I just want to make something quick for dinner. So I steam a Japanese sweet potato and mix it up with salted butter, and then I have the salmon with some of the green romesco sauce on top. I make an avocado, asparagus, and fennel salad with parsley, Marcona almonds, and a honey-balsamic vinaigrette. I also have a coconut horchata I spotted at Happier Grocery. I\u2019m shocked at how good it is.<\/p>\n Friday, April 25<\/strong> I answer some emails and go to a Pilates class, and it\u2019s so nice out that I decide I\u2019ll have a picnic in the park. I stop by Takahachi Bakery<\/a> in Bushwick and get their egg-salad sandwich, which is honestly one of my top-five favorite sandwiches in New York. They make a milk bread that is absolutely incredible, and it\u2019s all perfectly seasoned with salt and pepper. Oh my God, so good. I eat it with Autumncrisp grapes \u2014 these giant green grapes that are really crunchy \u2014 a homemade trail mix of pistachios, walnuts, almonds, pecans, dried strawberries, and blackberries; and hazelnut dark chocolate that I brought back from Italy.<\/p>\n For dinner, I end up reworking my leftovers: salmon from Happier Grocery, romesco sauce, and Japanese sweet potato, except this time with ghee instead of salted butter. I make a sugar-snap-pea, fennel, parsley, and avocado salad with a maple, lemon, and blackcurrant Dijon vinaigrette. I use seaweed sheets to make little bites of everything and drink some coconut water and lemon-lavender water.<\/p>\n Afterward, I end up going to karaoke in Flushing for a friend\u2019s birthday, but first I make a sparkling matcha with honey. I sing two songs: \u201cSomebody to Love,\u201d by Justin Bieber, and a duet of \u201cNo Air,\u201d by Jordin Sparks.<\/p>\n Saturday, April 26<\/strong> Lately, people have been doing \u201ceggs six ways<\/a>\u201d\u00a0online \u2014\u00a0basically just getting very inventive with their eggs; a hard-boiled egg with peanut butter and jelly or salmon roe, for instance. To be honest, the videos, and the way some people are choosing their toppings, really frighten me. I decide to try to do it in a way that I would actually enjoy and not get grossed out by. I collect different types of mustard and end up making a deviled-egg flight<\/a> using some of my favorite mustards that I kind of associate with spring and summer flavor profiles \u2014\u00a0a blueberry-seed mustard from Raye\u2019s<\/a>, a company in Maine, and a blackcurrant Dijon, a tarragon mustard, and another honey-balsamic mustard, all from Edmond Fallot<\/a>. It is a lotta eggs, but they\u2019re really good. And they kind of look like the Pretty Patties<\/a> from SpongeBob.<\/p>\n I do some work and then I make what I call a little kid\u2019s dinner: chicken tenders; baked Japanese sweet-potato fries; and raw sugar snap peas, carrot, and fennel. I add an assortment of sauces. There\u2019s Kewpie mayo, because I prefer mayonnaise with my fries; tarragon mustard; the romesco sauce; and a yellow datterino ketchup I stumbled upon in L.A. years ago. When I was back there this past October, I went around town trying to track it down again; I tried all the shoppy shops and only found it on my last day. It\u2019s incredible. I scroll Pinterest before bed, mostly looking at food pictures \u2014 I\u2019m not searching for recipes so much as pretty, aesthetic photos. I\u2019m like, Ooh, that looks yummy. I can make that.<\/p>\n EAT LIKE THE EXPERTS.<\/p>\n Sign up for the Grub Street newsletter.<\/p>\n Vox Media, LLC Terms and Privacy Notice<\/p>\n
I\u2019m visiting my parents in New Hampshire for Easter, and this is my last full day of the trip and also the first time I\u2019ve spent the holiday with my family in probably five years \u2014 I usually stay home and work because, you know, cakes and holidays. I live alone and I\u2019m always making single-portioned meals, so I\u2019ve been really excited to cook for them. Plus, it\u2019s nice to be in a big kitchen and have a grill.<\/p>\n
Today is a travel day. For breakfast, I have a piece of spelt-y whole-wheat baguette from Nick + Sons<\/a> that I actually brought to New Hampshire from New York. I have some salted butter on that \u2014 I prefer thick, cold slices; I like to see teeth marks. On the side, I have a scrambled egg, a fig, a honeycrisp apple, and a date, plus a little dollop of that Greek yogurt. Plus my three drinks: an Americano with honey, rosemary tea, and some green juice.<\/p>\n
Every time I come back to New York after a trip, I bring back a big carry-on cooler filled with food. Yesterday I hauled some leftovers, New Hampshire produce, eggs from my favorite farm, and a bag of frozen blueberries my mom and I picked last summer that I\u2019ll use in my cakes.<\/p>\n
That same breakfast again! Greek yogurt with my nut mix, thick honey, and honeycrisp apple, and dried strawberries and blackberries from a brand called Ziba Foods<\/a>. Plus a date, a jammy egg, and my three-drink minimum.<\/p>\n
For breakfast, I try some Maple Hill yogurt. People told me it was going to have that barnyard-y flavor, but it\u2019s really sour, and I actually don\u2019t like it. I have it with nuts and a dark autumn honey; the label says the bees pollinate near knotweed, which apparently has something to do with how it tastes. I found it robust and super-floral, with a nice caramelized flavor. Then more of the crispy grapes, a date, an apple, and a soft-boiled egg. I go through little fixations on certain things, and today I decide I\u2019m now going to be obsessed with soft-boiled eggs rather than jammy ones.<\/p>\n