Confetti soap with Rape seed oil

The tiered cake stand is a part of our dinner service and gets
a lot of use. I pile cookies and candy on it at Christmas
and at other times it may store ginger, lemons or whatever.

I had planned to do this soap before New Years day.  I thought it would be so appropriate for the occasion, but I didn't do much soaping during the holidays.  Being the cheepskate... strike that... thrifty, the way I am, I have been saving my off cuts and putting them in a small bowl.  It was starting to look really pretty with all the colours, so I could just see how it would make a lovely looking soap.  It didn't quite turn out the way I wanted, but now I know what I should have done differently.  And that is what it's all about, isn't it?

There is nothing wrong with the soap of course, but I had envisioned it white with smaller speckles of colour.  So why exactly I used Orris root, lemongrass EO and large bits is beyond me!  Except of course I had just gotten the Orris root and had to try it, I hadn't really thought about the colours of the EO's until I poured them and I thought that if I used a grater it would get too small so I chopped it into pieces.  But I like the scent and I used lots of it.  Maybe too much, but that was an accident.

This is also the first soap that I do with Rape seed (Canola) oil.  I have always had this thing about it.  I mean, it's used as a motor oil and up till recently it wasn't edible.  I will still absolutely not use it as food although I might consider it's use as biodiesel.

I am rather pleased with the decoration.  I have gotten these curled bits of soap when trimming and then when I saw what pretty decorations some people used them for I decided to make them especially for decoration.  That was not successful and now I have no idea how I accidentally got the few that I had.  Life is just really strange that way sometimes.

The recipe I used (The soap was 5% superfatted):

30% Coconut oil
30% Olive oil
25% Rape seed oil
10% Cocoa butter
5% Castor oil

I used some sugar in the water which was 30% of the oils.  Maybe a little too much discount on the water, the soap was very quick to trace after I put the EO's in.

The soap bits are ends of soaps that have been coloured with Rumex oil (the pink), Annato (yellow) and Alkanet (lavender).  I used 1 tsp of Titanium dioxide to get the background a bit lighter.  The scent was a blend of Lavender, Rosewood, Lemongras and Ylang Ylang and I used 1 tsp of the Orris root powder to see if the fragrance lasts better.

I did try the of cuts of this soap to see what it is like and I have to say that this recipe has a very creamy lather.  Don't know if that is the Rape seed oil, the sugar or just this combination.  I'll get a better feel for it when it has cured.  One thing that I feel that this soap could have benefitted from is a few scaps of green soap.  It would have made the decoration on top a little bit more flower like.  So that has to be my next soap.  A green trial using dried parsley.

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Hmmm... Bread?

I have a few cross stitch pieces that my great aunt made.
She gave many of them to my daughter but I have still to
put them in a frame yet. Love the tureen with the
vegetable decoration. It came from my mother in law.

I have been thinking that I may be suffering from a serious midlife crisis.  Like the middle aged men who run out and buy motorcycles, trade in their wife for a younger model and so on.  Except my symptoms are an obsessive interest in making things.  All sorts of things.  And one obsessive interest seems to breed another and snowball into a collection of unfulfilled areas of interest that manifests in a stack of books.

The other day I suddenly got an urge to bake a sourdough rye bread.  I honestly do not know where I got that idea from.  Most often my interests seem to evolve naturally from one area to another:  Soap to creams and lotions and back to soap on to essential oils and medicinal plants with a detour to crocheting borders for duvet covers and from there to dyeing with natural materials to bookbinding (yes! Bookbinding is fascinating), but this had no connection to anything else and surprised me.  I love to bake cakes and cookies, but that is just selfish, indulgent greed.  Bread?  No!  Tried it once.  Killed the yeast.  Decided it was not for me.  But then I got this strong urge.  One problem with a sudden urge to make sourdough bread is that one has to have a starter to make it.  Making a starter takes at least a week if successful.  So I have been having a close relationship with Grumpy, my starter, for a few weeks.  It wasn't successful at first.  He seems to be in good shape now and I have high hopes for his longevity.

It was a bumpy ride that started with an innocent mix of rye flour and water in equal amounts.  I used a glass jar.  Then I waited for it to start to bubble.  I stirred it every day, twice a day, until it did.  Then I fed it.  Also every day.  This involves discarding half of it and adding more flour.  It soon started to ferment and bubble quite happily.  It was a bit like magic.  Life from nothing, it seemed.  But getting from there to bread is only a part of the way.  My first attempts went into the trash with an loud bang.  I could have killed a man with that heavy blunt instrument.  This last one I baked in a cast iron pot that was too big, so it looks flat, but it tastes very, very good.  I also think that I may be starving my starter.  But I'm getting there.  I used a recipe from The Fresh Loaf site.  The recipe for the first bread is:

300 g. Whole wheat
150 g. Spelt
50 g. Rye
50 g. Whole grain starter

375 g. Water
10 g. Salt

I used my rye starter which is a bit wet.  If the starter is very  dry then use less, about 40 g.
This recipe is very simple and it worked fine for me.  I dissolved the starter in the water.  Added the salt.  Then the flour, which I had mixed well with a whisk.  I use my Kitchen aid mixer with a dough hook to mix the dry and wet ingredients.  Then I put the dough (it's sticky) into an oiled bowl and covered it with a plastic bag and a towel.  Placed it somewhere warm and draft free,  I let it rise overnight on the kitchen counter, for 10- 12 hours.

There is the wet finger test to see if it has risen fully.  You poke a wet finger into the dough up to the first knuckle.  If the hole remains and doesn't spring back then the dough is fully risen.  Then the dough is taken out, stretched a bit and folded, this should be done gently to preserve the gas bubbles that the rising has produced.  Then the dough is shaped into a ball.  It then needs to sit for another 2-3 hours and should rise again.  I put mine into a cast iron pot that had been heated in the oven at 230 C / 450 F.  I put a lid on and let it bake for 40 - 50 minutes, the last 10-15 without the lid.  To test for doneness one can apparently knock on the bottom of the bread and it should sound hollow.  This process is beyond my comprehension so I prefer to stick an instant read thermometer into the center of the bread.  The internal temperature should be about 99 C / 210 F.

I will continue to work on my bread until I get the perfect loaf.  I still have some way to go and taking good care of Grumpy is a high priority now.