Grooming Edit – Dr Lancer, The Lancer Method

I was fortunate to trial the Method from Los Angeles based Dr. Lancer. Claiming to make the skin look younger, its effectiveness lies in its simplicity; a three-step daily routine. As time is precious most mornings – school runs, meetings, site visits, smashing up the alarm clock – we were keen to try something quick and easy without compromising on quality.

This Sums Up Fatherhood

Step One – The Method Polish
The scrub has a warming element that is felt when you rub it in your hands. Its strange at first, good strange. The polish bead is good and holds well on wet skin meaning you get an effective scrub without it dissolving too rapidly. Skin is left vibrant and energised

The Method Polish

Step Two – The Method Cleanse
Probably the weakest link in the chain here. It’s a gentle cleanser but I guess, after the strength of the polish, a gentle cleanse is all that’s needed. It helps at the very least to completely remove the polish and we found that there was no trace dirt following a cotton pad test.

The Method Cleanse

Step Three – The Method Nourish
The cream itself is quite thick and supplied with an application spoon so as to keep it contaminant free. Fancy! It covers well and the density means that one application is sufficient as it doesn’t leave the skin feeling dry skin minutes later.

The Method Nourish

The Verdict?
The whole process was completed within 5 minutes which is not long at all. All in all a great product to use daily at home it comes with 2 thumbs up us in terms of quality and effectiveness.

The downfall however is the price tag. Combined the products will set you back a whopping £213! This will make it inaccessible to the majority. For alternatives try the Neal’s Yard NYR range, the excellent Liz Earle which we will be reviewing next month or our go to brand, Kiehl’s men’s range

Neal’s Yard Remedies NYR Organic Range for Men

Liz Earle’s Men’s Naturally Active Range

Kiehl’s Men’s Facial Fuel Range

Lactofree Poppy Seed & Raspberry Muffins

As promised here is the recipe for the utterly divine muffins featured in our last post. If meeting the parents, showing first time buyers your DIY disaster of a pad or living above a third rate fast food establishment, then you may want to whip up a batch of these right away!

Ingredients (You can squeeze a gut busting 24 Muffins out of this recipe)
315g plain flour
230g caster sugar
230ml Lactofree raspberry yoghurt
200g fresh raspberries
115g Lactofree spreadable
35g poppy seeds
5 medium egg yokes
3 medium egg whites
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
½ tsp baking powder
A large pinch of sea salt
¼ tsp cream of tartar

All You Need To Get Started

Get Stuck In
1. Pre-Heat the oven to 170°C and line a muffin tin with muffin cases.

2. In a large bowl beat the Lactofree spreadable in a bowl with half the sugar until light and fluffy. Add the egg yolks one at a time making sure each is fully incorporated before adding the next one. Lastly mix in the yoghurt, vanilla and poppy seeds and set aside.

Its All In The Mix

Add One Yolk at a Time

3. Sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda, baking powder and salt into a medium bowl and set aside.

4. In a separate bowl, start to whisk the egg whites, adding, very quickly, the remaining sugar and cream of tartar. Keep mixing until a meringue forms. This should take around 5 minutes so don’t lose heart like the kids (and I) did.

Meringue at Last

5. Fold the meringue into the egg yolk mixture before folding in the flour. Be careful as you do not want to knock all the air out of your lovely meringue! Lastly fold in the raspberries very lightly to avoid bruising or bursting them.

Fold Gently

Caught White Fingered!

6. Divide the mixture between the cases and bake for around 18-23 minutes. The muffins will have browned and should spring back when touched. For a final check a toothpick should come out clean when inserted. Cool in the tin for 5 minutes then transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Pre-Tanned Muffins

Delicious!

And there you have it. Delicious with coffee, ice cream or even just air!

So handsome

Chef Masterclass with Tom Aikens and Lactofree

It’s certainly not every day you get to smell success but that’s exactly what went down today at L’Atelier des Chefs. A food brunch storm was whipped up with a little help from Michelin Starred Chef Tom Aikens and a lot of love from Lactofree.

Lacticious?

Me, Tom and AB

Lactofree have a lot of friends. Half the Caribbean population, spearheaded by my Aunty SuSu (probably not her real name), have a lot of time for Lactofree; for they have come up with a genius way to extract the lactose from everyday dairy products we love. They do this by skimming cow’s milk and adding enzymes to help break down the lactose, the gloopy sugar, found in things like milk, cheese, yoghurt and cream. It’s this gloopy sugar that thousands of us find extremely difficult to digest. Yes this gloopy sugar is the father of food babies the world over!

Granola with Lactofree Raspberry Yoghurt – Clean Start to the Day

Front of the Class

The key thing about Lactofree, Tom said, is that it tastes like dairy products, it cooks like dairy products and it bakes like dairy products. There is no compromise on taste or quality. We didn’t heckle Tom – We did however nudge the people either side of us and made the face. Then we, very diplomatically, put this theory to a baking test by watching Tom Aikens whisk, fold and shift together poppy seed and raspberry muffins right before our eyes. The key Lactofree ingredients were Lactofree butter, Lactofree yoghurt and meringue. The results were amazing. A firm springy exterior with an unbelievably light and fluffy interior peppered with beautiful sharp, fresh raspberries throughout. We even tried to eat the smell and gave thought to breaking out in a modicum of body popping!

Whisking Tom Aikens

Meringue-ing Tom Aikens

Spooning Tom Aikens (Stop the Sniggering!)

Next we got stuck in re-creating Tom’s Lactofree Mushroom Ragout on Toast with Chervil Sorrel. A bit of a mouthful. The key Lactofree ingredient here is Lactofree cream. The results… well I think they speak for themselves. Even Tom, we reckon, considered breaking out in a modicum of body popping.

…Modicum – no reason, we just like saying it.

Diced Finger With a Few Choice Herbs

Mushrooms and a Smidge of Madeira (hic)

All Ready For the Toast

Man Toast – Cooked by Tom Aikens’ 1000 Yard Stare

The Student becomes the Master!!!

E Voila! Mushroom Ragout on Toast with Fresh Herbs

Lactofree already have an extensive range of products which you can find out about here. So whats stopping you? To kick start you We’ll post the muffin recipe in our next post.

No Food Baby

No Food Baby!

Food Baby!