Off topic Archives

Posted on October 6, 2017 by Vicki — 14 Comments

Viennese Fingers (Blogtober 6)

Soapmakers Eat Too…

Every year, in mid-August, our village holds a Horticultural & Craft Show. Gardeners, photographers, crafters and cooks compete to show off their skills and be the best in their category. Our garden is still a work in progress, I’m no photographer and I’ve had no time recently for any craft bar soapmaking, but baking… now baking I can do. I entered six classes, and won four firsts and two seconds (go me!) One of the firsts was for my Viennese Fingers*

Ok, so these may look a little wonky, but they’re prize winners! They really are the lightest, crumbliest and shortest of biscuits which are ridiculously easy and surprisingly quick to make. I’ve been making at least one batch (usually two!) of these each week recently and they’re loved by the whole family. Give ’em a go and impress your nearest and dearest.

Before you start, preheat your oven to 180C – if you have a super-efficient oven then you might want to reduce it to 170/175C, but either way keep an eye on the biscuits as they’re cooking.

This recipe will make approx. 20 fingers.

Ingredients:

175g soft margarine (you could use butter, but I’ve found marge is better in these)
60g icing sugar
125g plain flour
60g cornflour
100-150g plain dark chocolate

You’ll also need a piping bag and nozzle. This is the one I use.

It needs to be be fairly big as the mixture is quite dense – this one is 3cm diameter at its wide end…

To make up the biscuit mix, thoroughly beat together the margarine and the icing sugar with an electric mixer:

Ingredients, thoroughly combined — Margarine & Icing Sugar

Add the two flours and mix well again:

Now you’re ready to pipe – it really IS that easy 🙂

Place the nozzle into the piping bag (I often use disposable piping bags blah blah…and fill the bag with the biscuit mixture. I find it helps to place the bag into a large glass and fold the ends over the top of the glass to hold it in place…

Grab a couple of baking sheets, cover them with greaseproof / baking paper – do NOT grease neither the trays nor the baking paper. Pipe 10 ‘fingers’ of mix onto each lined tray (leaving 1-2cm between them as they will spread a little). As you can see from this picture my piping isn’t particularly uniform, but who cares?!

Put them in the oven and time them for 14-15 minutes. See these little round ones at the front? That’s what I do with any mixture left in the bag that I don’t think will make a full finger-worth of biscuit – perfect sized morsels to pop in your mouth when nobody’s looking 😉

You want them just cooked, barely beginning to brown… The ones on the top here are too brown – you want them more like the ones on the bottom..

WHILE they’re in the oven, break up melt the dark chocolate. I stand a narrow mug in boiling water in a saucepan, and melt the chocolate in that.

Once cooked, take the fingers out of the oven, leave to cool for a few moments, then transfer them onto a wire rack to cool. DO NOT throw away the greaseproof/baking paper – we’re going to use it again in just a moment.

When the fingers are cool to the touch, take them one by one and dip one end, and then the other, in the melted chocolate. Place it back down on the greaseproof/baking paper on the baking tray. Try to make sure that the chocolate from one finger doesn’t touch the chocolate from another or they’ll stick together when solidified and can be difficult to part without breaking the fingers themselves.

If (like me) you find this process a little tedious, simply place the fingers onto the greaseproof/baking paper and drizzle the melted chocolate all over them:

Dipped or Drizzled? You choose... — Dipped or Drizzled? You choose…

Place them, still on their lined trays, into the refrigerator for half an hour then hey presto, you have the most delicious accompaniment to your afternoon cup of tea. Or coffee, if you absolutely must 😉

Thanks for reading, back tomorrow!

Vickx

*Ahem* I’m going to completely gloss over the fact that I was actually the only person to enter the Viennese Fingers category in this year’s show. I am reliably informed that had they not been up to scratch, I would absolutely, definitely, without a doubt, NOT have been awarded a first for them. And anyway, they WERE bloody good!!!

Posted on September 12, 2017 by Vicki — 1 Comment

An Outdoor Adventure – The Week in Soap 10th Sept, ’17

It’s Tuesday eve, and I think I’m pushing the time limit for posting a round-up of last week, so I’m going to make this a quickie…

The main focus of the beginning of last week was ‘Back to School’, which didn’t actually happen until Tuesday, when both kids headed into school with a quick kiss and barely a look back. I gave a little jump for joy, and headed straight into the soap kitchen to make soap. Mostly restocks (double batches of Bewitched & Luscious Lavender) but also made some progress on the Christmas stock – a double batch of Warm Gingerbread which, as per the test batch, moved really quickly, but I managed to get a small drop element in there. Cut photos to come next week I hope…

Bewitched, Warm Gingerbread & Luscious Lavender

I added a little mica swirl on the top of the Warm Gingerbread, just for some added interest:

Wednesday and Thursday I was at the (part-time) day job, but managed to find some time to start on cutting, bevelling, wrapping and labelling a big order of mini guest bars.

The rest of the week was spent doing the usual soapy stuff, including spending as much time as I could uploading info and photos to the website – I think I’m still on track to launch at the beginning of October *crosses fingers*

Friday… Friday was kind of special, and had been planned for a while. Before having children my husband and I used to do a lot of hill / mountain walking, but we’d not been to the top of a mountain for about eight years. With both kids in school, we packed a lunch and off we went. The weather wasn’t great and we got a good soaking on the way up, but the weather cleared at the summit and we were rewarded with a lovely view. We descended in sunshine and were dry before we got home. It was absolute heaven, and we’re already planning the next one…

Posted on September 12, 2017 by Vicki — 1 Comment

An Outdoor Adventure – The Week in Soap 10th Sept, ’17

It’s Tuesday eve, and I think I’m pushing the time limit for posting a round-up of last week, so I’m going to make this a quickie…

I added a little mica swirl on the top of the Warm Gingerbread, just for some added interest:

Wednesday and Thursday I was at the (part-time) day job, but managed to find some time to start on cutting, bevelling, wrapping and labelling a big order of mini guest bars.

Posted on April 10, 2017 by Vicki — Leave a comment

The Week in Soap: 9th April ’17

A day late, but better late than never eh? Anyway, this weekly update will be super-short. The kids are off school for the Easter break, and I have even less time than usual to get all the things done…

I only managed one night of soaping in the last week – I made double batches of Boho Baby and OMH. I tried using a mica called ‘Arctic White’ instead of Titanium Dioxide for the white portion of the OMH, and I really wish I hadn’t, but hey ho, it’s good to try something different occasionally (shan’t be trying that one again though!):

Last week I also managed to hastily put together a post outlining the core range of soaps. It’s a poor substitute for a website, but at least now when I’m asked what I have it’s all listed in one place and I can just send a link. It has however highlighted the fact that I need to do some work on product descriptions and on photography (though luckily my husband just bought a DSLR camera so that might happen soon) before I launch the website.

The second bit of news is that I made facial soap – finally! It was on the goals lists for the last two months and while I’ve been working on the recipe for quite a while, I just never got round to actually making it. I put a lot of research into this one, and while it’s colour and fragrance free, it’s chock full of some other amazing ingredients. I’ll post separately about it soon.

Now I’m (kind of) back on track goals wise, I should be thinking about April’s goals but you know what? We’re already 10 days in and I’ve got 14 days of school holidays to get through – I’m cutting myself some slack and not setting goals for April. I’ll just keep on building inventory (starting to feel a little more comfortable with the numbers on the rack now), wrapping / labelling, fulfilling orders and doing my weekly soapy presentation / monthly market.

Thanks for reading, back soon!

Posted on March 28, 2017 by Vicki — 10 Comments

The PERFECT Yorkshire Puddings (I promise!)

Yorkshire puds. Those crispy, crunchy yet soft in the middle mopper-uppers of homemade gravy are the perfect accompaniment to a Sunday (or-any-otherday) Roast. They’re traditionally served with roast beef, but I’d be very unpopular in our house if I dared serve ANY type of roast without Yorkshire puddings. Luckily I have the perfect, fail-safe recipe to guarantee golden crispy loveliness each and every time:

When I posted a few weeks ago that I’d made some Yorkshire Puddings, Sarah of Sas-Oki Soaps challenged me to post the recipe so that she could decide for herself whether it truly is foolproof, so here it is! I hope more of you will give it a try too.

To make 12 delicious Yorkshire Puddings you’ll need:

150g plain (all purpose) flour
300ml semi-skimmed milk
2 medium sized eggs
plenty of salt & pepper
lard (for cooking)

Pre-heat oven to 230c / fan 210c / gas 8

Whisk the two eggs into the milk, and season the flour well with the salt and pepper.

Seasoned flour and eggs whisked into milk

Slowly beat the eggy milk into the flour until it’s all combined:

then pour it into a jug and let it sit for half an hour. (When I’ve been in a hurry I have made them without letting them sit for very long and not noticed much difference in the result, but I still let it stand if I can):

After half an hour or so, put a generous knob of lard into each cavity of a 12 cavity muffin tin:

then place the tray into the preheated oven and let it get smoking hot. Really, REALLY hot. Take the tray out of oven and place it on the hob, over some heat – the aim is to prevent the lard from cooling down before/while you pour the batter.

Pour the batter into each cavity of the tray, filling them about two thirds full. If you have a little left over top up some of the cavities – it doesn’t matter if some are fuller than others. While your pouring you should see that the fat is so hot that the batter begins sizzling and bubbling immediately:

Pop the tray straight into the hot oven, and cook for approx 25 minutes, or until they’re puffed up, brown and crispy. Keep an eye on their progress, they might take a little less time, they might take a little longer, but at this high temperature they could burn quite quickly if you leave them in too long. Oh, and don’t open the over door before the cooking time is up, or they’ll collapse…

I took some snaps of my last lot every five minutes or so – apologies for the picture quality, the oven door doesn’t make for a great window!

Serve as soon as possible after taking out of the oven:

There – told you it was easy! There is absolutely NO excuse to buy ready made Yorkshire Puddings ever gain 😀

Posted on March 6, 2017 by Vicki — 6 Comments

Teisen Gri – Traditional Welsh Cakes – A Recipe

Teisen Gri (literally translated – Griddle Cakes) are traditional Welsh cakes that we make and enjoy all year, and especially around the 1st March when we celebrate St David’s Day (the patron saint of Wales). Last week I took a break from soaping and made (another) batch of deliciousness…

They’re similar to a fruit scone, but flatter and cooked on a griddle over direct heat. Traditionally they’re dusted with caster sugar after cooking, but I usually skip that step. They are honestly utterly delicious – perfect to have with a cup of tea, and they’ll keep a good few days in an airtight container. They don’t tend to last that long in our house though! I posted the above picture on the blog a while back, and I’ve been asked a couple of times since for the recipe, so here goes. This recipe makes 20 – 30 Teisen Gri, depending on the size of the cutter you use.

Ingredients:

225g salted butter (lard is a traditional alternative – I always use butter)
450g self raising flour
0.5tsp mixed powdered spice
170g caster sugar
170g mixed dried fruit (currants are traditionally used)
2 eggs

Method:

Rub together the flour and the butter until they are the consistency of breadcrumbs. I usually do mine in a food processor:

2. Mix in the mixed spices, sugar and the mixed fruit:

Don’t forget the mixed spices – makes a huge difference to the final flavour

3. Add the two eggs and mix:

4. Bring it all together on a floured surface, adding a little more flour IF it feels too sticky to roll out:

5. Roll out the dough to about 0.75cm. Many recipes say 1cm thickness, and while personally I find this a little too thick, it’s trial and error to find what suits you. I neglected to take a photo of this stage – sorry!

6. Cut out rounds using a fluted scone cutter, and place on a pre-heated griddle. Don’t grease the griddle – dry is best. A thick bottomed frying pan would work if you don’t have a griddle:

7. After a couple of minutes, when the underside has developed a nice dark colour (some of these below should really have been darker) flip over and cook on the other side:

8. Once they’re cooked and nicely browned on both sides, place on a cooling tray and, if desired, dredge with castor sugar. Enjoy hot or cold, with or without butter.

I’ll be back on topic with my next post, but even soapers have to eat eh? Let me know if you give these a try (and what you think of them!!)

Posted on November 20, 2016 by Vicki — 2 Comments

Commitment

I’m slipping. After successfully completing Blogtober, I planned on continuing to post at least twice a week, but because I don’t have that challenge mentality it’s just not happening. I need a plan. I need structure and regularity (and a little more determination :-D).

So here’s the deal. I’m making a commitment, now, to post a minimum of twice a week, most likely on a Sunday and a Wednesday. I plan on doing a weekly roundup on a Sunday evening of everything soapy (or maybe the top 5 soapy events / the best soapy stuff) that has/have happened that week. I’d also like to start sharing some book reviews (I have an AWFUL lot of soapmaking books, for starters) and also posts about other products that I’ve tried and enjoyed.

Somewhat disconcertingly, out of all my Blogtober posts, the one that received the most ‘likes’ was the recipe for a Swiss Roll. Ohhhh, OK. Nothing to do with soap at all. Well, this blog is supposed to be about my soaping life, and baking is part of that, so I will probably share some more of my favourites – occasionally.

I do have plenty of ideas for the Wednesday blog posts, I just need to buckle down and write them. Now that I’ve made a commitment to post more regularly, I think I will!

Posted on October 27, 2016 by Vicki — Leave a comment

Free time? What’s that?

Last month I posted this photo on my Instagram page:

Lovely Language Literature :) — Lovely Language Literature 🙂

It’s a selection of books I’d bought with some Amazon vouchers I’d received for my birthday back in July. At various points in the subsequent comments I mentioned that my degree is in Linguistics, and as well as being fluent in a second language (Welsh), I have also studied French, German, Spanish and Russian. Ever since my teenage years I’ve had a passion for anything to do with language in general, and to this day I have a special interest in the history of language and how different language interrelate.

I was fascinated by the comments this post elicited from other soapmakers – so many are bi- or even multi-lingual, and/or have an interest in history, as well as a huge variety of other interests and hobbies. Soap, soapmaking and soapy social media have a tendency to dominate my life and I forget to take a break and do something completely different. Truth be told I struggle to find the time to stop and do something different. Having a business that is also one’s hobby is not the best combination for a good work/life balance it would appear. In the last six weeks I’ve managed to read just the first 35 pages of one of those books, despite finding it deeply absorbing (I usually manage 1.5 – 2 pages in bed before nodding off, no matter how hard I fight it).

So, go on, tell me what you do in your free time. What are your interests, your passions, and how do you find the time to indulge them?

Posted on October 19, 2016 by Vicki — Leave a comment

10 Favourite Foods

When I woke on Saturday 1st October, the idea for this blogfest of daily posting came from some fellow bloggers who had all committed to participate in Blogtober 2016 as organised by Mandi at Hex Mum +1

I very much wanted to do my own thing though. I needed to get used to blogging again after a few months away from the keyboard, and I also wanted to find out whether I would/could be inspired to find something to write about every day.

Having got halfway through the month it seems that inspiration isn’t an issue at all, but lack of time is. I have ideas for many posts, but many of them will take more time than I usually have to do justice to the topic.

So today I’m going to rattle off a fairly quick one, and for this I’m referring back to Mandi’s original list of themes:

October 19th – 10 Favourite Foods.

I love food. I was a terribly picky, fussy child, but as an adult there’s very little I won’t eat. Unfortunately, while I’m eating my way through the foods of the world (except for tripe, and goat’s cheese, bleugh!) my children are channelling my youthful aversion to anything remotely interesting. Karma…

So, in the interests of sharing a little more of me, I give you 10 of my favourite foods, in no particular order (note, I don’t say my 10 favourite foods – there are far too many favourites for that kind of narrow mindedness :-D)

Cheese. Yep, despite considering goat’s cheese to be an abomination, I LOVE all other types of cheese, especially Camembert and Stilton. A good mature cheddar is a thing of wonder too.
Chocolate Mousse. Not just any chocolate mousse mind. It has to be a dense, rich, dark chocolate mousse. The more like a ganache the better…
Smoked Salmon.
Great bread dipped in extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar
Moules Marinière
Steak (rare) and chips
Crispy, oven baked jacket potato with (real) butter and cheese
My mum’s raspberry trifle. Oh my word I salivate just thinking about it. I guess I should share the recipe here sometime.
Pizza. Not necessarily a fancy pants pizza, just one made by my husband with plenty of mozzarella, pepperoni, onions, peppers and mushrooms. Yum!
Chicken fajitas, nice and spicy with lots of guacamole and sour cream. A traditional Saturday Night In dish in our house.

I’m not sure whether there’s anything more you can read between the lines here, but there you go, you now know a little more about this Soapmaker.

Posted on October 15, 2016 by Vicki — 3 Comments

Swiss Roll

Today has mostly been spent keeping the children occupied, made easier by the fact we had a 3rd birthday party to attend this afternoon – 28 small children and a bouncy castle kept the adults on their toes! Once the kids were in bed, wrapping and labelling soap took up most of my evening and once again I’m on the threshold of being late with my latest Blogtober post. Deadline is T minus 80 minutes – eek!

Today I thought I’d share something a bit different. I’ve been baking for much, MUCH longer than I’ve been soaping; I was baking with my mother as a small girl, and I’ve continued to do throughout my adult life. There are undoubtedly similarities between soapmaking and baking, so I thought today I would share one of my recipes and see if I can’t inspire a soapmaker out there to try it.

Sadly, the time to bake just doesn’t seem to materialise these days, and the closest I get to baking is catching up with The Great British Bake Off while wrapping soap. Last week the contestants were asked to make a roulade, which, let’s be honest, is nothing more than a big, fancy Swiss Roll. Homemade Swiss Roll is MILES better than the mass produced ones that you can buy at the supermarket, is really quick to make and has the added bonus of being a fat-free sponge. What’s not to like?

Pre-heat your oven to 200C/400F/Gas 6

Take 3 large eggs. Weigh these three eggs (unbroken, in their shells) before you do anything else. Once you know the weight of the three eggs, you then need the same weight of caster sugar and plain flour.

Whisk together the eggs and the caster sugar with an electric hand whisk. You’ll need to keep whisking for a good 10 minutes. The mixture will thicken up and eventually will leave a trail when the whisk taken out of the mixture. It’s very similar to when soap batter reaches ‘trace’. Sift in half the flour, and fold in gently. You don’t want to lose any of the air that has been whisked into the mixture. Once the flour is completely folded in, do the same with the remaining flour. When the ingredients are all combined, pour into a greased, lined 12″ x 9″ baking tray.

Bake for 10-12 minutes, until the sponge is just cooked. If you go over, it’ll be difficult to roll.

Place a clean (!) tea towel over a cooling rack and dredge it with caster sugar. Turn the sponge out onto the tea towel, and immediately, while still piping hot, roll it up in the sugar coated cloth. Allow the sponge to cool down a little, for about 10 minutes, then very gently unroll and remove the cloth. The sponge will hold much of the ‘roll’, without cracking. Spread the ‘inside’ of the roll with jam, chocolate ganache, lemon curd or whatever takes your fancy, and roll it back up again. Ta-da! You could now carefully slice off both ends (just like a loaf of soap!) and make it look really pretty, but the most important thing is to enjoy!

This is the last one I made, filled with lemon curd. I’m now inspired to make another very soon and I’ll try to add some ‘making of’ pics to this post.

Right, I’m off to press that publish button. Deadline T -29mins 😀

Posted on October 14, 2016 by Vicki — Leave a comment

Happy Friday!

Blogtober Day 14

Yippee for Fridays! And today has been a particularly good day.

It’s my wedding anniversary. 11 years ago today I married my best friend, and today I’m counting my blessings just that little bit more.
I delivered the first order to a brand new stockist – more of that in another post very soon.
My ‘coming soon’ bathbombs received a glowing review.

Not a bad day eh? We’re off out this evening for a rare outing – dinner, just the two of us, without the constant interruption of children. I. CANNOT. WAIT.

Anyway, back to that bathbomb review. A couple of weeks ago I posted a picture of my trial bathbombs on Instagram and one of my IG buddies mentioned on the post how much she liked them. I offered to send her one to try, on the proviso that she give me her honest feedback. Well, turns out she loved it, and wrote a glowing review on her blog:

“The colour is awesome ! Unlike some bath bombs I have used before it doesn’t leave a horrid layer around the bath after draining the water . Neither does the colour stain the bath.”

Please check out the full review on Beauties and the Bibs There’s even a video of the bomb in action – please check it out!

It’s been a great day so far. Hope you have a wonderful one too.

Posted on October 11, 2016 by Vicki — 1 Comment

Home – Blogtober Day 11

A full third of the way through Blogtober, and I’ve had a good run of soapy posts (with a single bath bomby interlude for good measure), so perhaps it’s time to share something a little more personal.

Whoah now, don’t get excited. No please…don’t 😀 I’m just going to show you where I live, that’s all. And not even my house – the closest you’re getting is my village. And, if I’m entirely honest, I probably wouldn’t even share its name with you here, except it’s plastered all over my soap labels so I can hardly keep it a secret 🙂

I live in a small village called Beddgelert, within the Snowdonia National Park in North West Wales. It’s nestled in a valley mere minutes away from the foot of Snowdon itself, and surrounded by mountains and rivers, yet only 20 minutes away from the coast and some beautiful beaches. As someone who loves being outside, walking the hills or swimming in the sea, I honestly cannot think of anywhere in the UK I’d rather live (despite the rather high level of rainfall we have to put up with!)

This river runs right through the middle of the village and is ideal for a dip on hot days:

Or we can walk a little further downriver and spend some hours messing about in the water here:

A lot of the time though we try to get up high. The six year old seems to have boundless energy, but the three year old is still somewhat limited in how far and/or high she can go so we’re slowly increasing the length and elevation of our walks.

View from the Miner's Track (up Snowdon) — View from the Miner’s Track (up Snowdon)

I was brought up here, but spent a good 25 years of my life studying and working elsewhere, latterly in Manchester. There’s no doubt in my mind that moving back home to bring our children up in this area was one of the best things we’ve ever done.

My my, these blog posts are getting later and later – this one I’m publishing with just 2.5 hours to spare, but Blogtober, you’ve not beaten me yet!!

Posted on January 10, 2016 by Vicki — 4 Comments

2016 Personal Goals

I don’t do resolutions. Haven’t done for years. I can’t be bothered with airy fairy statements like ‘I resolve to get fit’ or ‘I resolve to learn a new language’ blah blah blah, which never seem to come to anything (for me, anyway)

I do, however, like the idea of having specific, measurable goals, and while I’ll cover my Business goals for 2016 in another post very soon, I wanted to share with you my two personal goals for this year. (Not least because I’m hoping that having to update here will make me more accountable!)

My first goal is to run 1,000km during 2016. Before having children I used to be a regular runner, but that was over six years ago, and I’ve been feeling recently that I want to regain my previous fitness levels. On paper, 1,000km seems a lot (especially as I ran a total of 93.5km last year!) but I really think it’s doable – it equates to 19.2km a week, or 83.3km a month. This week I’ve run 14.5km over four days (rest days on Wed & today – Sat) and I’m planning on going again tomorrow, so I’m on track:

and the distance I run per week should increase as I get fitter. That’s the plan anyway!

My second goal is far more sedentary – I plan to read 12 novels. Compared to how much I used to read, it seems a paltry number, nevertheless it will probably be a harder goal to achieve than my running one (I had the same goal last year and I read 4 (4!!) novels all year) But my evenings are almost always spent working – be it soapmaking, wrapping/labelling soap, paperwork, marketing etc etc etc. Add to that two young children, exercise time (see above!) and a part-time day job (with related compulsory coursework/study) and time for reading suddenly becomes rather hard to find. I hope to squeeze in half an hour reading at bedtime before my eyelids start to droop!

Number 1, and currently on my bedside table is Life after Life by Kate Atkinson:

Anyway, that’s it for now. Once again it’s approaching midnight and I’m nowhere near bed. Oh for more hours in the day lol!

Wish me luck, and let me know what your goals and/or resolutions are for 2016 🙂