DIY Under Eye Pads

BeauTEA recipe! 

New year, new blog topics! I got a magazine for Christmas with lots of homemade soaps, scrubs and other things. I've been looking at the ingredients to see what they are made up of and how I can incorporate tea!  

After doing a little research on liquorice and peppermint, I was pleased to see that both ingredients are said to have great skin benefits! I saw in several different places that Liquorice is actually used to help decrease dark circles under your eyes! 

This tea includes both ingredients so I decided to use that for my base. The recipe in the book used rosewater and on a quick trip to marshalls I found rosehip oil which is said to help fight wrinkles, perfect! In my recipe I say you can use either rosehip oil or rosewater but I actually used a bit of both. These two things give the eye pads a wonderful smell!

When brewing your tea, make sure that you let it cook before adding in the oil and rosewater. 

I would suggest cutting the cotton rounds into both wide and thin crescents. The wide ones can also be great to incorporate the tops of your cheeks!

When it comes to using the oil, I think it's actually best to use enough so that the mixture is fragrant so feel free to stray from the recipe here.

I let the pads soak in the mixture for 10-15 minutes then gave them a little squeeze and put them in a freezer bag. 

Keeping these cold is important because they are way more refreshing that way! If you want to use these in the morning, keep in mind that you'll need to let the pads thaw a little bit before using them so make sure you leave enough time! 

Also, a mistake I made was stacking them. They will thaw easier and keep their shape better if you put them in a bag in a single line. 

I used them this morning when I first woke up and I loved the sweet smell and the cooling sensation. I've tried a lot of under eye pads before and these were actually not that bad! Will these completley get rid of dark circles? I can't guarentee that, but they will leave your skin feeling cool and refreshed!

Mini Tea Bundt Cakes

I like little bundts. 

Another installment of teas in my Sips by box! These were a special addition to my normal samples. I won't lie, I'm used to drinking and baking/cooking with loose leaf tea only. I'm sometimes a little snobby when it comes to loose leaf vs. tea bags BUT to each their own!  I would normally use the milk or butter to infuse the loose leaf tea but since the tea in the bags is already ground I decided on a cake that I could thrown all of the tea into!

I recently found mini bundt pans at marshalls and thought that they would be the perfect way to make a cake but have it be special in it's own way. 

I'm not a fan of licorice but the combination of these two flavors really have a wonderful fragrance which comes through wonderfully in the cake while it's baking and when it comes out of the oven. 

This tea was pretty well ground but if you open the tea bags and there are any large pieces make sure to crush them up so that you're not getting a lot of crunch factor in your cake. You want the tea to be there visually and for taste but not to physically chew it up. 

An important note for using these pans, you have to do something with them or the batter will stick. I've seen people use parchment paper but I opted to use my misto to spray with olive oil and then flour them. Make sure to knock off excess flour because it will stick to the cake. 

Most things I bake taste pretty good but they're not always "magazine ready." This is a perfect example lol. I filled my tins almost to the top because I wanted to get as much cake as I could. They turned out fin but they don't really have a flat bottom so if you care about that make sure you don't fill the tin too high. 

See the white on my cakes, that means I needed to knock off a little more flour. It didn't interfere with the flavor but here is a lesson! Especially if you're over concerned with how they look, make sure to have a thin layer of flour. You can however always cover it with glaze :) 

I made my glaze pretty thick but thin enough to drizzle. If it's too thin it won't solidify but this part is completely up to you. I put 2 cups of confectioner's sugar in my recipe but use as much as you want to get desired consistency. MAKE SURE YOUR BUNDTS ARE COOL BEFORE GLAZING!!! Or else it will melt into your cakes. 

These tasted fine the next day but oh my gosh they tasted SO GOOD warm. The cake is thick but soft and the tartness of the glaze goes so well with the licorice and cinnamon in the cake. 

I want to get all sorts of bundt pans and try these! Do you have a favorite bundt pan?!