I’m a big fan of Philosphy’s bath & shower gels. I give them out as hostess and birthday gifts and love receiving them too.

They always smell amazing and the recipes printed on the bottles give me something to read while I’m soaking in the tub. I’ve often wondered what the recipes would taste like. So, when I got Red Velvet Cake bath gel, along with Sweet Creamy Frosting (body lotion) for Christmas and with Valentine’s Day around the corner, I decided to give ’em a try.

The verdict? The cake was extremely delicious, if on the very sweet side. There’s a lot of sugar in there! And, it’s not every day that I go through an entire pound of butter –  two sticks in the batter, two in the frosting. The recipe calls for two ounces of red food colouring, but I only had one 28 ml bottle, which is about half of what the recipe calls for –  but it didn’t seem to matter.  As you can see in the photo, the batter is a perfect colour match to the bath gel! Not that it matters for epicurean purposes, but it proves that Philosphy’s chemists did their homework!

Oddly enough, there’s a distinct cherry note in the bath gel fragrance that doesn’t correspond with the flavour of the cake – it tasted more like a light chocolate cake than anything else.

And, if you’re curious, here are the recipes from the containers:

Red Velvet Cake
2 cups sugar
2 sticks butter – room temperature
2 eggs
2 tbsp cocoa powder
2 oz red food coloring
2½ cups cake flour
1 tsp salt
1 cup buttermilk
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp vinegar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a mixing bowl, cream sugar and butter, beat until light and fluffy, add eggs one at a time, mix well after each egg. Mix cocoa and food coloring together, add to sugar mixture; mix. Sift flour and salt. Add flour mixture to the creamed mixture alternately with buttermilk. Blend in vanilla. In small bowl, combine baking soda and vinegar and add to mixture. Pour batter into three 8-inch round greased and floured pans. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Cool completely before frosting.

Sweet Creamy Frosting
3 cups confectioners’ sugar
1 cup butter
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 to 2 tbsp whipping cream

In a standing mixer fitted with a whisk, mix together sugar and butter. Mix on low speed until well blended and then increase speed to medium and beat for another 3 minutes. Add vanilla and cream and continue to beat on medium speed for 1 minute more, adding more cream if needed for spreading consistency.

Note: I don’t have a stand mixer (yet) and normally my trusty little hand mixer can handle any job that calls for mixing or beating. However, this recipe almost killed the motor of my little guy. It might have had something to do with how cold the butter was – room temperature in the depths of Canadian winter in an old house does not make for silky, easy mixing butter! At any rate, it made my want-o-meter for a stand mixer flare up.