Why Creativity Takes Time + Costs Money

The discussion came up with a customer:  The question was, “Why is this soap so much more expensive than this other soap?”

That’s a fair question, certainly.  Soap A (the less expensive one) requires a one-time pour with mica accents finger-brushed on top.  Soap B (the soap in question) COULD just take a one-time pour of a single color of soap, but this customer was expecting it to be colorful, and “colorful” meant several individual pours of different colored soap.  This took time, and since I’m a professional, time = money.  And I had to craft each soap individually.

Pelican soap
Pelican soap – This is it resting on its mould

And as I make slabs of soaps, the types I can whip up in one glorious pour, I think of what it takes to make various soaps.  I’ve made soaps before that are a simple scent and no color, or a scent and just one color.  Those are quick and simple to make.  Then there are the soaps with elaborate swirls and multiple colors, or soaps that contain interesting botanicals and custom created fragrance blends.  Truth is, I could whip out batch after batch of no-color scented soap, but that would be so boring!  We LOVE color!  And design and fun, unique fragrances, and everything else we bring to our soaps!  But creativity, again, takes time, and time is money, even when you enjoy what you do.

I tripped across this great video today that takes a look at the relationship between time and creativity.

https://www.facebook.com/binishkumarks/videos/10150455838601609/

 

Sure, creativity takes more time to achieve, but we are infinitely more pleased with our results.  We’ll continue to take the time to be creative, because it’s just so much more fun.

 

Divine German Chocolate Brownies

I guess I was feeling the withdrawal from not being able to do my usual Christmas cooking, so, right when I usually stop baking for a few months, suddenly I had the insane urge to make some brownies.  Since we don’t keep brownie mix in the pantry, the girls and I whipped up some brownies from scratch, but we wanted to kick these bad boys up a few notches, so we scrounged through the pantry and freezer to see what we could find.

First, we grabbed a can of condensed milk and stuck that in a pot of boiling water for 4 hours.  The result?  A divinely rich dulce de leche; it tasted very close to caramel, and would be perfect for dipping tart apple slices.

The girls whipped up the brownies we found here.

1 2/3 cups granulated sugar

3/4 cup baking cocoa

1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 eggs

2 tablespoons water

3/4 cups butter or margarine, melted

2 teaspoons vanilla

Chocolate chips and nuts, if desired

Preheat oven to 350 deg.  Grease 9×9″ baking pan (use a 9×13″ if just making plain brownies).

Combine dry ingredients in large mixer bowl; stir.  Add wet ingredients and stir well.

We spread half the brownie batter in the pan, then spread half the can of dulce de leche over it and sprinkled it with 3/4 cup unsweetened coconut and 1/2 cup chopped pecans.  Then we spread the remaining brownie batter on top of that, topping it with the rest of the dulce de leche, coconut, and chopped pecans.  We baked our brownies for 18-25 minutes (ours ran 25 minutes), then let them cool.  The toothpick came out a little sticky; this is normal.

German Chocolate Brownies, fresh from the oven
German Chocolate Brownies, fresh from the oven

Suffice it to say, these didn’t last long, but what a wonderful treat they were!

Looks absolutely amazing!
Looks absolutely amazing!