Something new: YouTube Video!

Happy monday everyone!

I hope you're all surviving the first day back at work or back in school, and I hope you didn't have any problems getting out of bed this morning! I had to get up at 7 am. It was just not the right time if you know what I mean!

Last week I've been thinking about about what I wanted to do for my blog, since I really like to try new things and trigger my creativity. Unfortunately my creativity failed on me, but the reason for that was perhaps that I was focussing a bit more on some other things. I'll ramble on about those things in a second but in the end I did manage to make something new for you guys: it's a youtube video!

Last week I had another one of those weeks where I didn't cook anything all week besides my breakfast. I know my mother would love to have a week like that but feel really disconnected if I don't cook my own food, I like to know what goes in it and the process of buying the ingredients and cooking everything is very soothing to me. I was also wearing a new (not necessarily pretty) accessory: a borrowed fitbit. If you're a bit into fitness you might have picked up on this hype, it is a little sensor that detects how many steps you take every day, how many stairs you climb, how many calories you burn etc. So at the same time I was focussing on moving around a bit more, but I was eating very unhealthy and I didn't cook anything... That seems a bit unbalanced, doesn't it?

This week I'm cooking again, and I'm also focussing on my fitness because I got some new running gear from my dad, which is a good incentive for me to go for a run. (By the way, if you are in need of some new running gear to get you out of the house, check out the H&M. I got the cutest and most comfortable top in bright orange with long sleeves and a little orange jacket to go with it and I'm soooo satisfied with the quality of the fabrics! And it's H&M so the prices are really wallet-friendly!)

My new flashy running gear :)

Back to the cooking... Most of the time I cook pretty healthy anyways, but I do like to bake. My personal philosophy is that if I have baked it myself it's not as bad as when I buy my treats because I'll end up sharing more and I only put in good ingredients in anything I bake. So when I finished my assignment on sunday afternoon I thought I deserved some little baking-time. I made madeleines again, and if you've been reading my blog for a while you know I have a blogpost about honey and earl grey madeleines, but this time I made lemon and poppyseed madeleines. This change is not really worth writing a whole new recipe so I did something else instead! I made my recipe into a little video!

It was very funny to film because I used my iPad, so I was holding it while stirring or picking things up, so every now and then you'll see me mis-grab something or just being very clumsy in general haha, but in the end it turned out to be quite cute, so I thought that would be a fun thing to start this week with!

I hope you guys enjoy it as well, please let me know if you do because then I know whether I should try to make these little clips more often! You can like it or comment on it or send me a message via twitter or via facebook, in general I just love getting messages from you :).

Lots of love,
Floor

Earl-grey honey madeleines on a sunny Saturday

Hey everyone! How are you? Did you have a nice and sunny sunday? I don't know whats up with the weather in the Netherlands, but it was so sunny here this weekend, I almost thought it was spring already. Cray-cray and I'm loving it!

Sunny view in the living room

I've been eyeing this recipe for green tea madeleines by Sorted Food for a little while now, the flavors really intrigued me and I loved the idea of small, portioned and light cakes! So when my mom treated me to a madeleine pan I knew what I wanted to make. Unfortunately I didn't have the ingredients to give my madeleines the green tea twist, so I went for a culture clash theme: delicate French madeleines with traditional English flavors! The result was sooooo yummy, and they look so cute on a pretty plate or cake standard, how could anyone resist?

Earl-grey honey madeleines

3 bags of traditional English tea or Earl grey

3 tbsp of boiling water

3 tbsp of melted butter

2 eggs

1/3 cup of sugar

2 tbsp of honey

2 tsp of vanilla

1/2 tsp grated lemon peel

3/4 cup of flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

Pinch of salt

Start with steeping your tea in the three tablespoons of water, over the cup you're making your super strong tea in! Leave it for 30 minutes and then add the tea to your melted butter untill you see something like this:

Melted butter with very strong tea

Mix your eggs with the sugar for about four minutes or untill you're left with a pale and foamy mixture, then add your flavourings: the honey, vanilla and lemon peel and let it mix for another minute. Then sift in your dry ingredients and slowly with a spatula fold the dry ingredients in and after that do the same with your melted butter / tea. Be very gentle because you don't want to beat out any of the air!

Sifting flour, salt and baking powder

The finished batter

Put clingfilm on the surface of your batter and chill it for at least 3 hours. After that the batter will seriously look like a mousse, so if you pull off the cling film and you see all of the air bubbles you know you've done well! 

Butter and flour your madeleine pan, preheat your oven to 200C and then carefully heap tablespoons of the batter in the madeleine shapes. You don't need to fill them completely, the mixture will rize a bit! 

Madeleine pan

Leave them in the oven for 10 minutes and I can recommend you to stare at them while they're cooking, I can promise you they won't freak out ;).

When they're done they are light and yummy and perfect with a cup of tea, especially when they are sprinkled with icing sugar!

Give them a go and let me know what you think, or please leave me a comment on my facebook page or in the comments below if you have any other flavor combination!

Lots of love,

Floor

Hyper Smash