Gooiest Cinnamon Buns.

These delicious cinnamon buns are pretty darn easy and seriously GOOOOOOEY!! I love recipes that involve lots of step by step photos, so I've added lots of photos for you too.

What you'll need: 

1 (.25 ounce) package active dry yeast
1/2 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
1/2 cup milk
1/4 cup white sugar
1/4 cup butter
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs, beaten
4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup butter
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 cup chopped pecans, divided (optional) 3/4 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
1/4 cup melted butter 

In a small bowl, dissolve 1 teaspoon sugar and yeast in warm water. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes. Warm the milk in a small saucepan until it bubbles, then remove from heat. Mix in 1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 cup butter and salt; stir until melted. Let cool until lukewarm.

In a large bowl, combine the yeast mixture, milk mixture, eggs and 1 1/2 cup flour; stir well to combine. Stir in the remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, beating well after each addition. When the dough has pulled together, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, about 8 minutes.

Lightly oil a large bowl, place the dough in the bowl and turn to coat with oil. Cover with a damp cloth and let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 1 hour.

While dough is rising, melt 3/4 cup butter in a small saucepan over medium heat. Stir in 3/4 cup brown sugar, whisking until smooth. Pour into greased 9x13 inch baking pan. Sprinkle bottom of pan with 1/2 cup pecans; set aside. Melt remaining butter; set aside. Combine remaining 3/4 cup brown sugar, 1/2 cup pecans, and cinnamon; set aside.

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface, roll into an 18x14 inch rectangle. 

Brush with 2 tablespoons melted butter, leaving 1/2 inch border uncovered; sprinkle with brown sugar cinnamon mixture. 

Starting at long side, tightly roll up, pinching seam to seal. Brush with remaining 2 tablespoons butter. 

With serrated knife, cut into 15 pieces. 

Place cut side down, in prepared pan. 

Cover and let rise for 1 hour or until doubled in volume.  Meanwhile, preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).

Bake in preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes, until golden brown. 

Let cool in pan for 3 minutes,

 then invert onto serving platter. Scrape remaining filling from the pan onto the rolls.

Stay tuned next week (so long as I'm not in labour) for another recipe from me and my kitchen!

Double Chocolate Mousse Filled Fresh Mint Cupcakes

These double chocolate mousse filled fresh mint cupcakes are easy, delicious and dressed to impress. These recipes here will make enough for 12 cupcakes. Have fun decorating!

So, you'll have to start with the chocolate cupcake!

You'll need:

1 1/8 cups all purpose flour

1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

1 1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup white sugar

1 egg

2 teaspoon vanillas extract

3/4 cup milk

1/2 cup butter, melted

1/2 cup of chocolate chips, or coarsely chopped chocolate

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a bowl, whisk egg and sugar until smooth and no lumps remain. Add milk, melted butter and vanilla, and mix until combined. Sift dry ingredients together and add to wet mixture. Mix until batter is smooth. Fold in milk chocolate. Line a muffin tin with liners and measure a heaping 1/4 cup of the batter to place in each liner. Bake for 15-18 minutes. Cool.

 

Then you'll need to make chocolate mousse. This recipe is SUPER fast and easy. About 5 minutes actually! Aaaaaaand, you'll have left overs to eat afterwards if you want!

You'll need:

4 oz high quality dark chocolate, chopped

1 1/4 cup heavy whipping cream

1/4 cup extra fine sugar

1 large egg

Instructions:

In a small saucepan, heat half of the cream until it begins to boil. Turn off the heat, add the chocolate pieces and stir until the chocolate has melted and the mixture is smooth. Pour the mixture into a bowl set over a large bowl of iced water and add the rest of the cream. Using a hand-held mixer, beat the mixture to soft peaks. Remove the bowl from the iced water. Separate egg white into a stainless steal bowl. Whisk the egg white with a hand-held mixer, beat until stiff peaks start to form. Add the sugar, a tablespoon at a time, and continue whisking to a soft meringue. Carefully fold the meringue through the chocolate mixture, then place some in your piping bag. 

(If you don't want to make mousse from scratch, I recommend whipping up a package of Dr Oetker's chocolate mousse.)

Take your cooled cupcakes and cut in to the top taking a small amount in the centre out. Cut the bottom of that little scooped part off and eat it. You want to have enough room in the centre of your cupcake for the chocolate mousse. Then pipe the mousse in the centre of the cupcake and place the top back on!

Now you'll need to make the icing!  

You'll need:

1/2 cup butter, at room temperature

2 cups powdered sugar

1/4 cup fresh mint leaves, chopped very fine

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1-2 tablespoons milk, if needed

food colouring

Instructions:

Beat butter in the bowl with an electric mixer until smooth and creamy, about 2 minutes. Add in powdered sugar gradually (about 1/2 cup at a time) with the mixer on low speed, slowly increasing the speed and it combines. Add food colouring (I added about 15 drops of green to get this colour. Add in fresh mint and vanilla and continue to mix. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl about 4-5 times, and mix for about 4-5 minutes on medium-high speed. Add in milk one tablespoons at a time if you need it or find that the frosting is not creamy enough. Place in piping bag. 

Place icing in to a piping bag and decorate those cupcakes! I then garnished with a simple fresh mint leaf, but you can do whatever you want! They will look beautiful and blow peoples minds because when you use the fresh mint over an extract, it makes them taste UNREAL!

Seriously?! Look at these! Amazing! And SO SO DELICIOUS! 


Stay tuned next Sunday for another recipe from me and my kitchen! (But don't worry, I will also blog before then too!)

 

  

Summer Mini Session Event

I am having a SUMMER MINI SESSION EVENT from August 8th to the 12th! Click the photo below for more info!

Not only that, but, I am trying to get to 200 fans on my photography fanpage:

www.facebook.com/HeatherBaysPhotography
If I make it to 200 fans by the end of the month of July, I will be GIVING AWAY one mini session for FREE!!! Woohoo!! So, if you've been meaning to get portraits of your family, or kids, or yourself or with your partner or friend or even your pets, then here's your opportunity! Come like my page! And if you really love me, then please, share the news too!
Thanks,
Heather!!

Refresh!

I'm back! I know I know, it's been MONTHS! Where have I been? BUUUUUUUSY!!!! We bought a house, our baby turned in to a busy toddler, I got pregnant again (due somewhere between Aug. 12 and Sept. 16) and I have focused more on my businesses. Now that I feel like I have this life juggling act under control, I thought I would attempt blogging again. I have missed writing. It's a great outlet.

For my first post back, I thought I would start simple. With a recipe. A delicious refreshing summer time drink that I was OH SO ADDICTED to when we were in India. It's 4 simple ingredients and you can make bigger condensed batches so you just add water and ta-da!

Lemon Mint Juice

What you need:
-lemons
-fresh mint leaves
-sugar
-water.

Juice about 6 lemons and store in a mason jar or something similar. Take about 60 or 70 mint leaves (more if you really love mint) and dry roast them for about a minute. In a blender, or food processor, put 8 tablespoons of sugar and 2 cups of cold water and all the dry roasted mint leaves. Then blend for a minute or so. Pour your sweet mint juice through a strainer into a mason jar or something similar.

Then all you do it put about 1 part lemon juice to 2 parts mint juice to 3 or 4 parts cold water (with ice too if you like) in a tall glass and give a little stir! This recipe is very easy to adjust to your preference. You may like more lemon, or more mint, or less sugar...so play around.

PS: Growing your own mint is SO super easy! Fresh herbs and spices are just the best! I grow 2 different kinds. Just a regular green mint and a pineapple mint. Both ideal for this refreshing beverage. Go to your local farmers market or even the greenhouse at places like Superstore, and they'll have some mint plants!

Oh Christmas.

Well, it's that time of year again. The time to indulge! You worked for weeks preparing for this holiday and in within hours, it will all unravel. It's like a bloody wedding, only it happens every year!! I need simplicity. I find that the long line ups at big box stores, and the greedy children with the competitive parents a bit too much to stomach. 'Tis the season for GIVING! I think we forgot what giving means. It doesn't mean to give Wal-Mart gift cards, or buy something silly for the sake of having a gift. It doesn't even mean buying your daughter those $200 boots that she ASKED you to buy her for Christmas. It is about giving yourself. Where is the love in a gift card? Or a cell phone?

Christmas isn't just one day for a lot of people. You get a steady steam of gifts for a few days in and around the 25th as you visit with different people. And some people will hope for gift certificates so they can afford to do the last of their Christmas shopping! Or some people just regift their gifts so they have gifts to give. I hate how people hem and haw over getting gifts for certain people because god forbid they receive a gift and not have one to give in return. Oh and of course my favourite one..."you can't give a gift from a second hand store". How stressful. I grew up watching Charlie Brown Christmas and Pink Panther Christmas, I was constantly being taught by Christmas movies that Christmas isn't about presents, it's about giving a piece of you to someone in need, or as an act of love to someone you care about. But then I was constantly being threatened that Santa's watching and he'll take away my presents. These are very confusing messages, especially for a child. Which message do you want your child to understand?

Please know I say all this because I am experiencing that last minute Christmas rush. Which I know if my fault for leaving all this until the last minute, but just know that, if I had the time to get this done earlier, I would have. (My life is on the worlds fastest roller coaster ride right now, but luckily I'm about to get off!) I found myself at Chapters. I went in with a list of like 30 people and went through the store checking off people as I saw things. Then I stood in what felt like the worlds longest line up and paid a $300 bill before heading to the next one. Now with a couple more people to get for, I gotta go hit the stores on December 24th. So I get to witness and experience this mass amounts of consumerism which is not what Christmas is about. I also think I feel a little out of sorts because I did NO CHRISTMAS BAKING!!! Can you believe that!? Baking is just one of those things for me. Brings me back down. Instead I will just think of my ideal Christmas...we get together, eat food we all made together, sing songs and jam together, have a few drinks together in a warm cozy environment, maybe have a little no-pressure gift exchange. It's just so wonderful.

Laugh.

Make the photo bigger by clicking it!

Bug Turns One!

My goooooooodness!! Exactly one year ago right now, I was pushing out a baby! At this moment 365 days ago, I would have been getting out of my bath tub to rip down a shower curtain to birth my baby on. Wanna read more about my home birth? Please click HERE. It was the best day of my life. Moments after birthing Adelaide, I said, "I would SO do that again!" So intimate, so personal, so loving, so real, so magical, so perfect.
Happy Birthday darlin'!

And The Winner Is......

CONGRATULATIONS KATE!!! Please email me at heatherbays@gmail.com! Let me know what flavour cupcake you'd like to arrive in your mailbox!! YAY!!!

It's Tea Time with Banana Chocolate Cupcakes.

This is a European recipe, so I converted the grams and ounces to cups and mls. I have European measuring utensils appropriate for this recipe, so if you have American measuring utensils then half a cup for me is 118mls whereas half a cup for you is 125mls. This recipe is written in my measurements with yours in the brackets.  

CUPCAKES
   118 mls (half cup) butter
   177 mls (3/4 cup) sugar
   2 eggs
   2 large mashed ripe bananas
   1 tsp baking soda
   2 tbsp boiling milk
   1 tsp baking powder
   236 mls (1 cup) flour

Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time. Mix in mashed banana. Add baking soda that has been dissolved in the boiled milk. Mix in sifted flour and baking powder. Don't over beat batter!
Bake at 325 F for 18-25 minutes. Until they are light golden on top and a toothpick comes out clean.

    

CHOCOLATE FROSTING
   148 mls (2/3 cup) unsalted softened butter
   207 mls (3/4 + 1/8 cup [or 5/8 cup]) confectioners sugar
   29 mls (1/8 cup) cocoa powder
   1 tbsp lukewarm milk
   1 tsp vanilla

Cream butter and sift in the confectioners sugar and cocoa powder. Add the milk and vanilla. If it needs more milk, add up to 1 more teaspoon of lukewarm milk. Mix until well incorporated. If it looks curdled, add more confectioners sugar.

Words of Life

"You can speak to your children of life,
but your words are not life itself.
You can show them what you see,
but your showing and their seeing
are forever different things.

You cannot speak to them of Divinity Itself.
But you can share with them
the millions of manifestations of this Reality
arrayed before them every moment.
Since these manifestations have their origin
in the Tao,
the visible will reveal the invisible to them.

Don't mistake your desire to talk for their
readiness to listen.
Far more important are the wordless truths they
learn from you.
If you take delight in the ordinary wonder of
life,
they will feel the depth of your pleasure
and learn to experience joy.
If you walk with them in the darkness of life's
mysteries
you will open the gate to understanding.
They will learn to see in the darkness
and not be afraid.

*

Go for a slow and mindful walk.
Show them every little thing that catches your
eye.
Notice every little thing that catches theirs.
Don't look for lessons or seek to teach great
things.
Just notice.
The lesson will teach itself."

-The Parent's Tao Te Ching.
Every parent should read this book.

And for more on the Tao, check out Nothing Just Is.