Morning friends – I hope you all had lovely weekends <3
This weekend was a bit of a lazy one for Cole and I, but I’m not ashamed to admit it. Sometimes, I just love a good lazy Saturday – don’t you? You know, the kind of Saturday where you spend most of your day either at home, or putting around town with no agenda, and generally accomplishing nothing in particular? These are my kind of Saturdays. There is just something so satisfying about waking up naturally – {as opposed to the sound of a beeping alarm} – even if you are like me and still manage to wake up before 7am on Saturdays without fail, despite the fact that you know you are allowed to sleep in. {Yes, I actually do this every Saturday – what can I say? I’m a morning person}.
Even though I love these lazy Saturdays now, the idea of it is actually something of a new concept for me. Up until about a year ago I would always schedule my Saturdays kind of like how I schedule my work days – completely structured down to the last detail. Is this strange? I am a planner, so it was always just natural for me to create a to-do list for my Saturdays. I would fill it up with the kind of errands that “need to get done”, but you don’t ever have time to do during the week. So inevitably, I would always find myself stressing out on Saturdays unnecessarily over the tasks that I just had to get done. I think you can guess where this is going… because my lists were always unrealistically long, I was usually unable to actually get everything done. – So I would stress all day about having a failure of a day off just because I couldn’t check off all the things on my list. Do you ever do this? It sounds so silly I know, but for the longest time I just couldn’t help myself.
Cole is the one to whom I owe my lazy Saturdaymentality to, because he is much more of a relaxed person than me. I am a complete and utter stress case most of the time, but Cole has really helped to mellow me out over the years, and this is still something that I work on everyday. It’s so easy to just let life fly by when you are busy planning and stressing, because you are never taking the time to savour the moment when you are in that mentality. Cole has always had this amazing ability to be present in the moment and not let the idea of tomorrow keep him from enjoying the here and now. It’s something I admire in him and a state of mind that I am definitely trying to adopt, because it really makes you enjoy the little things in life so much more.
So after years of my my completely exhausting habit, I decided it was time to just stop, and let Saturdays be days that are one hundred percent free of planning for me. After all, isn’t that what the weekend is about – taking the time to give yourself a good relaxation sesh? Mmhmm. So now the only thing that I vow on Saturdays is that they consist of at least one or more of the following things…
1. Extra cuddle time with Cole; 2. A baking session {or two}; 3. A nice long walk or 4.Catch up time with the family. – Because all of these things mean so much more than silly errands.
All that being said, these so called lazy Saturdays have become much more of a sporadic occurrence for us in the last six months since we joined the Haney Farmers Market. Normally we have a Farmers Market ever Saturday, which means that I am up at 3am baking up a storm and Cole is up at 6:30 packing and setting up all of the stuff for our booth {like the amazing boyfriend that he is}. So even though we love being a part of our local Farmers Market every week, it does mean that we don’t often get to share these kind of Saturdays anymore. I have to say that I kind of like it this way though – because I think it helps us to appreciate our time together when we finally do get the day to ourselves.
This particular Saturday was made even more special by a new addition of our home – our new little ball of fluff Katniss. Yes – we got a kitty, and before you even ask, we did in fact name her after the heroin in the Hunger Games Trilogy. The name is just so fitting for her, that we simply couldn’t resist the temptation. We are completely smitten with her cuteness and were excited for our first Saturday with her in our home. So in keeping with the above mentioned mentality of stress-free Saturdays – Our lazy Saturday went a little something like this…
Basking in our cozy bed, with some extra morning cuddles; kitty play time; late homemade breaky with these Whole Wheat Maple and Apple Biscuits {recipe to come below}; more kitty play time; kitty nap time – I used this time to do some laid back market prep for next week, while Cole worked on our ongoing dining room table DIY project {will post about this when it’s all done :D}; next was even more kitty play time; then we ate lunch in the sun on our patio {homemade toasted chicken BLT’s – yum!}; Took a stroll through Haney Farmers Market {just cause we love it there so much. – and I wanted apples…}; Then it was off to Coles mum’s place for a little macaroon baking sesh, dinner, movie and of course… more kitty play time {because we of course had to bring her along for the fun.}
So basically, a very successful and wonderful lazy Saturday that was made even more special by the addition of our fluffy little nugget Katniss, {and of course, these Whole Wheat Maple and Apple Biscuits}. These biscuits really just embody the whole premise of how amazing it is when you combine sweet & salty to create the most delicious flavours that I honestly can’t even properly describe to you.
These biscuits are truly killer – they are so tender, with the most unbelievable flavour from the combination of the sweet maple syrup, the salty bacon, the tart apples and the warm spices. This is the perfect biscuit to kick off your fall 2015 baking. So because I can’t figure out how to better describe how delicious they are, here is the recipe so you can find out for yourself 🙂
Whole Wheat Maple and Apple Biscuits
Makes: 10-12 medium biscuits
Things you need…
Biscuits
6 slices of bacon, cut into small chunks
2 tart apples, chopped {Granny Smith or McIntosh}
1 cup all purpose flour
1 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup cornmeal
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup butter, cold
2 tbsp bacon fat, chilled
1/4 cup maple syrup
1/4 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 tsp apple cider vinegar
1/2 tsp vanilla
2 tbsp melted butter
maple sugar
Glaze
1/2 cup icing sugar
2 tbsp maple syrup
a couple drops of vanilla extract
How to make…
Glaze
In a small bowl, whisk together icing sugar, vanilla and maple syrup until combined; set aside until ready to use.
Biscuits
In a skillet over medium heat, cook bacon until crispy. Pour 2 tbsp of the rendered baking fat into a heatproof bowl and transfer to the refrigerator or freezer to cool completely until firm. Place the cooked bacon in the fridge to cool completely as well.
Meanwhile, place the chopped apple, brown sugar and apple cider vinegar in the same skillet that you cooked the bacon; cook over medium heat until golden and tender. Remove the apples from the heat and place in the refrigerator to cool completely.
**Make ahead; You can prepare your bacon and apples the night before – this is what I usually do and it makes for super easy morning prep.
Preheat your oven to 400 degrees and line a baking sheet with parchment paper; set aside.
In a glass measuring cup, whisk together maple syrup, buttermilk, heavy cream, and vanilla to combine; set in the fridge until ready to use.
In a large mixing bowl, whisk together flour, whole wheat flour, cornmeal, baking powder, baking soda, salt, nutmeg, and cinnamon until combined. Cut your butter and chilled fat into cubes and work into the dry ingredients with your fingers or a pastry cutter until pea sized chunks of fat remain. Next, stir in the cold bacon and apples to evenly distribute.
Drizzle the chilled wet ingredients over the dry and use a fork or spatula to fold the wet ingredients into the dry until a ragged dough forms. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and fold it gently 3-4 times over itself {this will create those flaky biscuit layers} Next, pat or roll the dough out to 1 inch thickness and use a biscuit cutter or anything round to cut out your biscuits to the desired size. Gently press any scraps together to form any additional biscuits {I usually have enough to make about 1 more}.
Place biscuits on the prepared baking sheet, and brush with melted butter and sprinkle with maple sugar {you can get a big container of this from Costco}. Bake for 18-25 minutes in preheated oven or until golden brown and tops spring back to the touch.
Remove from the oven and allow to cool for a couple minutes before glazing, but try to glaze them while they are sill warm. Drizzle the glaze over top and allow to cool an additional 5-10 minutes before serving.
So if I have to be honest with you… I guess I should mention that these are definitely not a diet friendly biscuit…. but when something tastes this good – who can really care? I am a firm believer that you only live once, and it’s all about moderation right. Have one of these indulgent biscuits for breakfast and eat a nice light lunch and dinner – you won’t be sorry you indulged.
Wishing you all many lazy and happy weekends!
KP xoxo
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