Sweet Enough to Eat. But Don't!

#greatcakessoapworkschallenge #dessertsoaps #handmadesoap

Friday, May 15, 2015

1st - Let me warn you that this post is long because we are describing several different creations.  We have also included a TON of pictures.

Enjoy! (We sure did!)

This process actually began a couple of weeks ago when Kathy emailed me to let me know that she had entered us in the next soap challenge - mini desserts.  WHAT?

OK, Alison.  Don't panic.  We both love to cook, and we both love to make soap.  Why shouldn't we combine the two?  We set ourselves one restriction - only HP or CP.  We don't make soaps using melt and pour (M&P) so we didn't use any for this challenge.

Our week went like this:

Monday: make HP cinnamon rolls and small round cake layers

Tuesday: make CP batter and divide. 1/2 for lime pies, 1/2 for baked Alaska.  Left over batter to frost cakes

Wednesday: make CP batter for meringue to cover baked Alaska and to decorate the layer cakes

Thursday: use mica in oil to paint edges of meringue to look baked (they were too soft to paint on Wednesday); take final pictures.
Friday: final edit and decide which picture to submit while getting loaded and organized for tomorrow's Mountain Laurel Festival

When I started brainstorming on Monday, I immediately started thinking of cinnamon rolls.  No idea why.  That's just what popped into my head.  Cold process would be too difficult to handle that way, and hot process has a great rustic look that COULD look like bread, so hot process for the rolls it would be.

I did plan on and even shot some video, but the tripod kept collapsing and it didn't record the interesting part of the rolling of the batter.  I could show you the mixing and stirring and cooking, but that part is pretty mundane and boring without the visual of rolling out the "dough."

This challenge requires us to create 4 mini desserts, we are also required to include at least one real food element in each soap recipe.  We will start this blog with mini cinnamon rolls and finish with the mini cakes, here we go......

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The mini cinnamon rolls:

I used four food additives in this HP soap: goats milk, honey, cocoa (for color) and colloidal oatmeal once it was done.  I rolled the batter out on colloidal oatmeal and sprinkled more on top of the soap before I rolled it up and cut it into mini cinnamon rolls.

The "mini rolls"cooled and hardened for 24 hours.  

The next day, using white batter left over from the other mini dessert soaps (see them below), we added extra oil and water to thin the consistency and "glazed" the mini cinnamon rolls.

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For the remaining mini dessert soaps and the frosting, we created a soap recipe using cocoa butter, coconut oil, lard, olive and castor oils. The batter was so easy to work with, we loved using it.  The food additive in the recipe is goats milk.  

After we added the goats milk we divided the batter in half so we can use it in the other mini desserts, our next endeavor was the mini lime pies.

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Mini Lime Pies:

To create the pies, we used half of a 1 lb batch of batter.   The point of this soap challenge is the art of creating the visual, so fragrance is neither needed nor necessary, but Kathy and I can't leave that out.  If we are going to use ingredients making something, we want it to be used and enjoyed (even if it is just us who uses it!). So, we used fragrances, and we are so glad we did!

I have been wanting to try this new FO, and since it had lime in the title we decided it would be perfect for our mini lime pies.  Da lime in da coconut Fo and the Pistachio Mica are both from +Rustic Escentuals.

Love Love this FO!  It performed perfectly, no discoloring, no ricing and no acceleration.  

We used silicone cupcake molds for our "pie pans"

Pouring a small amount of batter for the "crust"

Then we added the mica directly into a small portion of the batter  which will be our lime filling.

Isn't it gorgeous?!?!

When we got ready to pipe the lattice work on top of the pies we tried using sandwich bags.... immediately the tip plopped right onto the top of the "pie"  OOPSIE!!! 

 Being the polished professionals we are we cleaned it up, smoothed it over and proceeded with our newly donated set of decorator bags and couplings.

Lattice work goes on top of the pies...so much easier without a sandwich bag.

We let them cure overnight.

The mini lime pies popped right out of the molds.

And here are the finished mini pies, on to the next mini dessert...

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Mini Baked Alaska

As we racked our brains for another mini dessert idea we looked around to see what inspired us. This dessert idea popped into Kathy's head when she spotted the small silicone bowls Alison found at a yard sale.   

With mini baked alaska we knew we would need

vanilla, strawberry and chocolate "ice cream" layers. 

  To create vanilla we did not add any color. For the strawberry we added Frosty Rose Petal mica, and for the chocolate we used Aborigine Amber, both are from +Rustic Escentuals. 

We used a new FO from Aztec International called Black Raspberry Vanilla, which interestingly enough was touted as having no vanilla. It did not discolor & we love it.

The fragrance is so wonderful that we had to remind ourselves not to lick the spatula.  No acceleration, no ricing, no discoloration. Of course we don't know how it will do as it cures, but for now it's great!  YAY! 

We mixed the micas directly into the divided soap batter and we instantly had our strawberry and chocolate "ice cream".

Strawberry layer first,

then vanilla....

and finally the chocolate.

We put the soap in the curing box for 24 hours to harden, then we 

removed them from the molds and prepared the "meringue."

We applied the soap batter with the back of a spoon to give it the look of meringue peaks.

We think it worked rather well.

Once we had the meringue spread, it was time to give it that toasted look.  We tried the sprinkle method, sprinkling a little Aborigine Amber mica onto the surface.

That didn't work. The mica just lay there in clumps and specks.

UGH!

So we picked all of the specks out with a skewer tip and then re-sculpted the meringue, peaks and all.

Next we tried the paintbrush method using the Aborigine Amber mica again but this time with a small amount of safflower oil. Using a paintbrush we lightly brushed the color onto the raised surfaces and peaks.

We found out in a hurry that the soap was too soft to apply any pressure, so we let them cure overnight.  

The next day the soap was hard enough, and we carefully applied our "toasty" look to the meringue.

Next we cut a slice of the mini baked Alaska. Honestly, it looked so good! We were so hungry once we finished these mini desserts.....

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And now to the 4th and final mini dessert...

The mini layer cakes:

After the mini cinnamon rolls, there was some HP soap batter left over, so I put it into small circle mold creating 6 small round soaps we will use as the "cake" for our mini layer cakes.

We used uncolored batter as the icing between the layers, then carefully iced the sides and top of the mini cakes.

Once both mini layer cakes were frosted we decided to let them cure overnight.  

We will wait a day and make more soap batter

to create our frosting decorations.

The next day we made another batch of soap which we used for the colored decorations on the mini cakes.

Originally we decided to use purple, pink, and green, but in the end we only used white, pink, and green.  We used the purple and any left over soap batter to make small square guest soaps. All of these colors - Purple Passion mica, Ooh La La mica, and Pistachio mica - are 

from +Rustic Escentuals.

The batter was the perfect consistency to pipe decorations, we used a small #16 tip for the edge of the top.

Looks nice, doesn't it? 

Kathy used the back of a spoon to create a rose.

Then carefully transferred it to the top of the mini cake.  I mean, soap.

Next she added some leaves and small rose buds to complete the top.

We just needed to add the final touches around the base of the mini cake and then decorate the second cake.

We are cutting into the mini cake so show what the inside looks like.

What an adventure this challenge has been, once again we have pushed ourselves to try new techniques and stretch our imaginations.....what fun we had.

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Table is set for tea time:

Honestly if you didn't know it was soap wouldn't you want to take a bite???

 Here is your plate!

A few more gratuitous shots just because we are rather proud of our creations: 

5-1-15 - Sweet & Green

#Kudzu #hotprocesssoap #handmadesoap #MountainLaurelFestival

Friday, May 1, 2015

The leafy green Kudzu may be "the vine that ate the South," but we sure do love our Kudzu soap! We aren't the only ones who love it.  Visitors to the Celebrate Clayton festival last weekend liked it so much that we didn't have enough left to fill a larger order that came in this week. What does that mean?  Yup!  I made me some kudzu soap today!

I keep saying "I" and "me" because Kathy is out of town for several days having a great time visiting family and friends.  She even kindly has been sending me videos of the beach and the ocean.  Boy, what I wouldn't give to be able to live at the beach!  Hey, I could make soap there, too! 

But enough day dreaming.  Let me tell you about this soap.  If you've been following this blog, you've probably seen us talk about our Kudzu soap before, so I won't bore you with too many details today.

Getting my hot process supplies together.  This soap uses olive, palm, coconut, and castor oils.

The fragrance oil comes from +Natures Garden.  

I never really paid much attention to Kudzu before other than to know that it was a parasitic vine vampire, but I've been learning some interesting things.  Who knew that kudzu actually has a blossom?!  Who knew that people use those blossoms to make things like jelly?!  It really does taste good.  And, this FO really does smell like the Kudzu blossom.  It is almost a grape-like smell but not too much because I really hate grapey smelling things like Kool-aid, or suckers, or anything like that - it's so fake!  This, though, is fresh and sweet and fruity.  It is really a wonderful fragrance.  

Oops.  Sorry.  Said I wouldn't bore you with details...

The colorant is Enchanted Forest Mica from +Rustic Escentuals.  We use this color quite a bit.

Once the crock pot was hot enough and the oils had melted, I added the lye/water and stick blended until the mixture reached a very thick trace.  When we do hot process, we like for the batter to be really puddin'-y thick by the time we stop stick blending.

Above shows how it looked after cooking on High for 30 minutes.  I stirred it well, replaced the lid, then set the timer for 15 minutes.  After the first 30 minutes, I stirred every 15 minutes until the soap was done.  This particular crock pot seems to cook at a lower temp than our others, so where we usually turn it down to low after 30 minutes, with this crock pot I only turned it down to low for the last 1/2 hour.

After 15 minutes (45 min total) it was beginning to really thicken.  At this point, the soap still has a gel-like appearance.

After another 15 minutes (1 hr total on high) The soap looked like this (above).  Still has a very gel-like appearance but getting harder as it cooks.  At this point, I turned the crock pot down to low.  (remember - all crock pots are different, so if you try hot process soap, don't get stuck on times and temperatures.  Go by the appearance of the soap.  Once you get a feel for how your crock pot cooks, then you'll have an idea about how much time you will need for future batches.)

After 15 minutes on low (1 hr 15 minutes total cook time at this point) I stirred again.  If you look at the left side of the picture you can see that the soap is becoming more white in appearance and less gel-like.

After 1 1/2 hours total cook time, the soap looked and smelled ready.  See the soap sticking to the sides of the crock pot?  That is something we have noticed happens as it approaches being done. (Again - after you do this several times you will get a feel for how it looks and smells). Next I incorporated another of the senses...taste.  Yep.  We always do "the zap" to double check for done-ness.  If there is still active lye in the soap, it will zap your tongue as if you had licked the posts on a 9-volt battery.  

Go ahead and find a battery and try it.  I'll still be here when you get back.  

JUST KIDDING!!  Don't do that.  Just take my word for it.

Anyway---I touched the batter to my tongue and it didn't zap or tingle at all.  It just tasted like soap.  If someone tried to wash my mouth out with soap now, I think I would be immune.

I did also use Ph test strips to test the soap.  It is hard for you to see the comparison without the chart that goes along with the strips, which I didn't include in this picture because it only just now occurred to me to do that...But I am showing you the strips so you'll see that we do test and double check the safety of our soap.  That is really important to us.

Interesting side note which you may or may not care about but I'm going to tell you anyway:

As I was cooking this soap, I noticed that our thrift store crock pot has the word "Scovill" on it.  Scovill is a company that is local to us, so I thought that was kind of cool. One of my very close friends from the community theater (he's also a distant cousin) has worked at Scovill for over 20 years, so...

I took a couple of pictures and sent them to him.  I just thought it was cool, but didn't figure that it could possibly be the same Scovill.  I was wrong! Scovill used to make parts for Hamilton Beach appliances when he started working there 25 years ago.  He sent back the photo below:

I just thought that was interesting. Also, I was just kidding when I said I wouldn't bore you with details today.

But back to the soap...

When it was done, I stirred in that delicious smelling fragrance oil and stirred vigorously.

I took out about 3 cups of batter for the green colorant.

Into the white portion of the batter, I stirred a small amount of dried, ground Kudzu leaves.  (Thoroughly washed, pressed dry between towels, then dried in the oven).  It adds a natural, mild exfoliant and some visual interest.

I added the colorant into the 3 cups of reserved batter

and stirred until it was evenly mixed.

I added the green batter back to the pot

and gently folded the two colors together

 to create a nice in-the-pot swirl.  

I slapped the batter into the mold, slammed it against the floor a few times (to evenly pack it in and get rid of air bubbles), added the dividers, slammed it on the floor a couple of more times, then put it in the curing room to cool for 24 hours.  Hot process soap doesn't need to "cure."  It is ready to use as soon as it's cool, but it helps to create a harder bar of soap if you let it sit out in the air and harden for an additional week after you make it.

On Saturday, May 2, I removed it from the mold.  We will deliver it to our customer in a week or so, and then the extra bars will be available at the Mountain Laurel Festival in Clarkesville, GA on Saturday, May 16.