Prettying the Presents

A few years ago, I ran an internet mail order business selling outdoor clothing.  I used to sell walking shoes amongst other things, which necessitating having a supply of brown paper, being the only thing copious enough to wrap them in.

I STILL have a fairly substantial roll of brown paper left, so rather than going out to buy bright new paper have used it for wrapping Christmas presents.  Not very festive, you might think! 

I had to find a way of brigthening them up, so ventured out into the rainy garden with a pair of scissors.  Here's what I snipped, although anything reasonably robust would do:-

Conifer leaves
Ivy leaves
Ivy berries
Rosemary sprigs
Sisyrinchium leaves

I had top pop them on a cloth on top of the radiator to dry them out a bit before I started.  I trimmed the ivy berries because the heads are round and I wanted them to sit flat in my bundles.

I then arranged all the elements loosely and simply wrapped the ends round and round in green cotton, then tied them in little decorative bunches.  I used nothing more glamorous than sellotape to stick them onto the parcels (using the cotton directly under the tape to get a bit of stick).  I'm sure they would have looked even more artistic with a bit of ribbon or, better still, some good old-fashioned hairy string!

Brandy Butter

This is somewhat last minute, but if you've only ever had custard with your Christmas pudding before, I need to put you right!

Brandy butter is delicious and melts all over your steaming Christmas pudding in the most irresistible way. I would NEVER, NEVER have custard on my pudding if brandy butter were available. It just doesn't seem to ever be on offer at restaurants alongside their standard festive fayre. Don't be lured to rum butter as an alternative either - brandy is by far the best.

RECIPE
3 oz butter (85 g) (leave it out of the fridge beforehand so it's nice and soft)
6 oz icing sugar (170g)
2 tablespoons brandy

Thoroughly mix the soft butter with the icing sugar, then whip in the brandy. If it curdles slightly (which it might well), you can add a little flour.

Pop it into the freezer for a couple of hours to get it nice and firm, then keep it covered in the fridge until immediately before serving. Wonderful!

Homemade Handcream

I've been fascinated by the idea of making homemade cream since a friend of mine told me she'd been on a course about it somewhere in rural North Dorset. This friend is a therapist (reiki, hot stone massage, etc.) who believes in using organic products in her treatments but has trouble sourcing those that she likes.

I did some internet research and came across a variety of recipes, then set about finding where I could buy the necessary ingredients online. I bought beeswax (in blocks) from Paynes Southdown Bee Farms and everything else I needed from The Soap Kitchen. I was quite excited after I'd made the orders, but had to wait two weeks before my Soap Kitchen order arrived (it seems they experience high sales volumes in the lead up to Christmas so I imagine there must be people out there who make handmade creams and cosmetics as presents).

My partner has really dry skin on her hands so I particularly wanted to make something suitable for her, and I didn't want it to smell too flowery. I therefore carefully researched my choices of essential oils and adapted one of the recipes I found to suit.

INGREDIENTS
10g beeswax (I had to grate the blocks)
16g cocoa butter
60ml / 4 tablespoons almond oil
90ml / 6 tablespoons water
20g emulsifying wax
10 drops fennel oil
10 drops rosemary oil

METHOD
You need to use a heatproof bowl which will sit over a saucepan of simmering water (the bowl should sit in the hot water). In that bowl, melt the cocoa butter, beeswax and almond oil.

Measuring out the above ingredients was quite tricky using my digital scales, which didn't cope well with such small quantities. In the end I managed it by taking the weight of what I wanted AWAY from what was on the scales in a heavy bowl, which worked perfectly.

At the same time, warm the 90ml (I used filtered) water with the emulsifying wax in a small microwaveable container. This took somewhere between 30-60 seconds ... and it re-solidifies quite fast as it cools!

Use an electric whisk to mix the melted emulsifying wax mixture into the melted oils mixture until it cools. It's similar to whisking cream in that it thickens (and whitens) as you continue to whisk.

When it's cool, then whisk in the essential oils. My oils were in little bottles with dropper tops, but I discovered they're quite difficult to control so you need to pour them into the mixture slowly and carefully if you're to stand a chance of counting the drops!

You can then put the mixture into jars. The amount above made about 125 ml volume of handcream.

RESULTS
It smells gorgeous and is a good thick consistency. Once decanted into pots, I rushed to find some humans to test it on ... my partner loves it! It definitely seems to be a superior product to any of the handcreams we've bought before, and believe me, my partner's hands are so dry that we've been prepared to spend some serious money on handcreams!