What She Ate// Baker's Choice

Chai Tea Coconut Scones

I was almost dreading the approach of this week's 'What She Ate' theme. The tropical conditions that have overcome this wet little country have knocked us all for six. It's all we can do to peel ourselves away from the sun loungers outside these days and the dogs seem to have attached themselves to the cool porcelain of the mantelpiece in the living room, startled by the immense heat.

Just as the thought of baking anything was starting to become unbearable to me today, it happened... as if by magic, the sky darkened and the storm clouds rolled in. 

For me there is no better excuse  for hot, buttery scones and tea than a wet cozy afternoon stuck indoors.

I adapted this scone recipe from a vegan recipe I found online. My recipe isn't strictly vegan though as I had to tweak here and adjust there to make do with what we had in our kitchen cupboards. 

I also tossed in a few little 'extras' for added yumminess ^.^

Ingredients

(makes 9 scones)

~ 2 cups flour

~ 1 tsp baking powder

~ 1/2 cup butter

~ 1/2 tsp sea salt

~ 1/2 cup dessicated coconut

~ 1 cup chai tea (soak 2 chai teabags in boiling water, I used the Twinings variety)

~1 tbsp flaxseed

~1/4 cup maple syrup

~ 1/4 cup honey

~ 1/3 cup brown sugar

~ 1 tsp apple cider vinegar

~ 1tsp vanilla extract

~ ground walnuts

~ roughly chopped Lindt coconut chocolate

~ toffee yoghurt

method

~ Heat oven to 400 F/ 200 C

~ In a large bowl mix flour, coconut, salt and baking powder.

~ Add butter and mix with fingers until dry ingredients are coated.

~Brew tea in a measuring jug and add flax seed, brown sugar, maple syrup, honey, vinegar and vanilla.

~ Pour wet ingredients into large bowl and stir with spoon.

~ Fold in ground walnuts and chocolate, knead lightly and roll into a ball.

~ Place dough ball in fridge for 20 minutes.

~ Remove dough and roll out onto floured surface, using a cutter cut 9 scones and place them on a floured baking sheet.

~ Brush each scone lightly with a little toffee yoghurt to make a sweet glaze on them.

~ Place in oven and bake for 15 minutes.

I was tempted to serve these with a glass of chai tea but I reckon it is possible to have too much of a good thing so I opted for a mug of regular tea the size of my own head instead!

These turned out delicious despite the fact they are semi vegan and I am more used to my Mom's scones baked in the good old fashioned Irish-style with eggs and milk as well as butter. These had a very delicate chai tea flavouring but you could definitely make it out (I'd probably use 3-4 teabags next time though) and the maple syrup and brown sugar with the walnuts gave them an almost flapjack-like flavour. 

Please share if you ever give these a try, I'd love to hear how they turned out for you!

Now, how about have a peek at the other 'Baker's Choice' editions this week:

Stacy @ Let it Unravel  | Kate @ Miner Temptations| Sondra @ Abhaya

I'll be back with another 'What She Ate' on August 9th with the them 'At the Farmer's Market'~ I can't wait for that one!

x

{{skinny}} maple chocolate milkshake

3 scoops low-fat vanilla ice cream

1 cup soy milk

1 teaspoon maple syrup

1 teaspoon unsweetened cocoa powder

blend

straw

slurp

welcome!

link party ♢ weekly wishes #4

This week I suffered a personal setback in regards to my application for the degree course I wanted to start this year. After sitting down with the prospectus, a notebook and a calculator I realized that the total monthly fees are going to be higher than I first thought and will be way out of my budget. My heart fell in to my feet when I realized this and that night I tossed and turned till 5 am, mind churning, feeling deflated and disappointed and angry at myself for not realizing sooner.

The following morning, after beating myself up over it all night and feeling pretty exhausted and low-spirited I turned to my best critic and biggest supporter. I talked to my Mom.

How do Mom's do it? After talking it through with her I felt stronger and more determined than ever. This is just a setback. I may not be able to do this particular course, but there will be another course I can do that better suits my budget. It's not defeat, it's simply back to the drawing board. I suppose I have a tendency to catastrophize situations; here I was thinking my dream lay shattered into tiny splinters at my feet. My Mom simply  bent down, picked up the pieces and rearranged them to make a slightly different picture, and I love her for that.

For this week's Weekly Wishes challenge I want to focus on something that will help redirect my mindset and emotional reactions and ultimately help me on my path to following my dream.

I've been teaching myself about the different chakras recently and I've learned some wonderful methods of opening the heart chakra which I think will benefit me in all aspects of my life.

This week I will challenge myself to apply the following methods to awaken my heart chakra because for me, to practise these in your daily life is to be a better, loving, and more accepting person...

~5 Ways to Open Your Heart Chakra~

1. Be love~ don't be a martyr, allow yourself to be loved, especially by yourself

2. Give love~ love others, love unconditionally and unselfishly and whether they are deserving of it or not

3. The grass isn't always greener~ like the quote says "comparison is the thief of joy", be happy with your lot

4. Practise yoga~ camel pose is a great one for clearing a blocked heart chakra

5. Forgive~ even if they are not sorry, let go of past anger, hurt, grief. Don't look back, you're not going that way.

~~~

I think that by trying my hardest to adhere to these pledges this week will definitely be a challenge, but it will help me to let go of certain things I don't need to carry any more and which may have been holding me back in my journey this far.

I'll be back next Monday to let you know how I got on.

If you read the first three words of the previous sentence and thought of Terminator then I love you and we should definitely be friends.

Peace

x

What She Ate// By the Campfire

Here is my humble edition to Stacy from Let it Unravel's 'What She Ate' link up.

The theme this week was 'By the Campfire' and while I missed out on seeing the Rolling Stones at Glastonbury this year (boo) we have been having lots of barbeque weather here on the green emerald isle lately (yay).

So while I technically didn't cook this over a campfire, it was grilled and it is now your new favourite campfire/barbeque dessert.

Barbequed banana split stuffed with dark chocolate chunks, flaked almonds and coconut yoghurt.

The execution is the easy part, no method required here really, just barbeque the banana on each side for 5 - 10 minutes before splitting the skin and forking in the fillings.

Now, trying to capture a photograph of something like that which doesn't look like old turd was the real challenge in this scenario, haha!

{and one that I epically failed at, at that!}

But when you have sweet melted chocolate around your mouth and licking fingers still sticky with soft banana and coconut yoghurt you won't really care what the dish looks like.... because it tastes like heaven ^.^

Check out the other ladies who have contributed to this week's 'What She Ate' here:

Stacy @ Let it Unravel  | Kate @ Miner Temptations

Next edition is 'Baker's Choice' on July 23rd.

Why not join in the fun?

x

link party ♢ weekly wishes #3

{{source}}

Time for Round 3 of Melyssa's Weekly Wishes link party!

My last wish was centred around an application I posted for an online Nutrional Therapy degree course that I want to dedicate the next 4 years to.

Guess what folks, I got an interview >.<

SO, I guess my wish this week will be that I prepare well and pull off the Skype interview so that they respond with a big fat "hell YEAH lady, we want you on our course, come on down!"

 Or a simple "your application has been successful" will suffice too I suppose!

While it is scary putting my personal goals and dreams out there for all to see every week, especially the prospect of being unsuccessful and looking like a failure,  it is at the same time a great push to get myself out there and try extra hard. If I kept this to myself I possibly wouldn't be as motivated, comfortable in the knowledge that if I don't get it then it doesn't make a difference because nobody knew about it anyway. Writing about it keeps me on my toes, keeps me hungry, gives me that extra little fight to really step up to the challenge and achieve something good.

It's not too late for you to jump on the Weekly Wishes gravy train, if for no other reason than to happen upon some really awesome blogs. I've definitely gained a few new additions to my Bloglovin reading list from clicking and commenting on blogs in this link up. 

Give it a try!

{{p.s ~ Google reader has officially shut up shop, so if you haven't made the switch already you can follow Stars in Jars on Bloglovin here ^.^}}