Bubble Bath Bars

I have been lamenting not having a Lush store near me. My absolutely favourite thing of theirs are the bubble bars. My mother's birthday was this past week, so I decided to try my hand at making her some.

All supplies can be purchased (at least in the States) from Snowdrift Farm. I find them to have the best prices in general for essential oils, which I use for cleaning products since I don't deal well with artificial scents. These bubble bars come out decently foamy, although I might like to experiment to see if I can get them to make more bubbles.



Sage Femme Bubble Bars
400 g baking soda
57 g citric acid
24 g coco betaine
27 g glycerine
2 drops green food colouring
1/2 tsp. clary sage
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp lavender
small amount of gum benzoin

Mix a little of the baking soda with the oils and food colouring. Add to remainder of baking soda and mix until it is evenly distributed. Add citric acid and mix well.

Combine the glycerine, coco betaine, and vanilla. Add to the dry ingredients and mix quickly. It will foam up a bit.

What I tried to do at this point is put it in rectangular soap molds that had been "floured" with baking soda. This didn't work so well, I kept having to push it down into the soap molds. Finally, I gave up and put it on parchment paper and tried to form it into little ovals. I think I might try hand forming it next time. If anyone else tries this, I'd be happy for suggestions or any tips that anyone discovers.

Bolludagur

Today is bolludagur in Iceland (I tried to find a good link but I guess just google it), so I got my mother-in-law's recipe and ended up spending most of yesterday making bollur.

Bollur

250 g margarine (NOT butter)
5 dl water
250 g (2 c.) flour
8 eggs

Melt margarine into water at lowest heat. Add flour and stir until it is all combined and thick. Set pot on back porch to cool (it shouldn't be too cold, 38C or so). When it's cooled off, beat the eggs in two at a time. The dough should be thick like bread dough. If it is too thin, beat in more flour.

Bake in tablespoonfuls on parchment-lined cookie sheet in 400F/200C oven, for 20-25 minutes, until puffed up and very slightly golden. DO NOT OPEN OVEN WHILE BAKING!!

Serve cut in half filled with whipped cream and jam or eggjaþykkni, and spread melted chocolate on top (Whole Foods now sells Nói Síríus chocolate, which of course is the best).

Eggjaþykkni (egg custard filling)

90 g (around 3/4 c.) flour
750 ml milk
6 egg yolks
120 g sugar (around 1/2 c)

Heat milk and flour on stove, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens. Beat egg yolks and sugar with an electric mixer at the highest speed. When milk mixture is thick, add to egg mixture and beat at the lowest speed until all mixed. Store in refrigerator.

Some notes:
* You may want to use stick margarine. I'm not sure if tub margarine has more water than stick margarine, or if American margarine has more water than Icelandic margarine. Either way, my mixture came out too thin, and I ended up having to beat in a whole extra cup of flour (a little at a time) to rescue it.
* You MUST use baking paper underneath or they WILL stick
* I found in my oven I could only cook one sheet at a time because otherwise there was not enough air circulation and they didn't puff up correctly.

OK, so there is some knitting talk... I got an advertisement in the mail from Bergere de France and there is a really cute book of baby knits with this adorable jean jacket.
I am thinking I may have to order this book so when I make gift knits I can make something from here.