Lettuce Share

I’ve been obsessed with my Joseph’s Coat roses all week.  Both plants are blooming – the original and its clone.  The clone is the only rooted rose to survive my mad gardener efforts.  This is its third bloom.

Unlike most roses that are grafted onto a stocky base, this one is a cutting grown straight in soil, so it’s a little scrawny.  I used a rooting hormone to get it started, and now it blooms once a year – one blossom.  The original has blooms to spare.  I paired two with red salvia yesterday for a quick hostess bouquet.   

After smelling, cutting, touching, and staring at the Joseph’s coat all week, my last obsession came to mind – soap-making!  The petals are soft and colorful with a beautiful scent – perfect.  I promptly plucked a handful and tossed them in my food processor. 

But they weren’t chopping.  As you can see in the photo, the petals were being scratched more than cut.  I popped four Vitamin E pills with a pin, squeezed the contents over the petals, and with a few quick pulses, had rose pesto.

I wanted to eat it, it looked so good in the processor.  Unfortunately, the color faded fast in the hot glycerin.

The lime rind in the coconut-lime soap tinted the glycerin a yellowish-green, so I assumed the rose petals would tint the soap pink or even a grayish-purple.  The latter was the disappointing result of mixing in the juice from a couple pomegranate seeds.  I’m hoping the dye from my Amaryllis will produce better results when they bloom in April.  Until then, the green will do.  The soap turned out nice.  I supplemented the fragrance with rose water; it’s a very light scent.  

These are my mold supplies – very economical but check for imprints.  One of my soap bars reads 997D4T with a recycle symbol.