In your experience, what are the best shaving foam brands to make pies with? I'm curious to know if anyone's tested different brands for this. Share any experiences you've had with different brands
In my own experience, most shop own brands tend to make better pies. I've found that Gilette foam is a bit watery and doesn't make a very good pie overall.
From the UK perspective, I'd say the more expensive the better. The Sensitive brands seem less harsh when used, and the top end Gillette brands (double or more the value price) produce a much firmer foam that stays together longer.
On larger sessions I've also tended to use the cheaper brands as filling and then decorate or do toppings with the expensive brands.
Its harder to get the expensive stuff nowadays though, more and more its Gel only in shops. I hope foam doesn't stop being sold, imagine the pain that would be!
From the US perspective, I've recently discovered Market Basket's own brand at $1.19/can. It has a good consistency and produces more foam per can than any other brand I've worked with so far. It's apparently made in China.
And it really seems to be up to personal preference and what you have access to in terms of shaving foam. To me, Barbasol is the best as it's rich, thick and sticks to you really well.
But no matter what you use, I've found that the two enemies of shaving foam are water and air. Try to minimize the sitting time out of the can before using it as it'll get a more sudzy, airy consistency if out for too long. And to get the most bang for your buck, warm up the cans first by putting them in warm or hot water before using. It really works!
Hot water absolutely works. The SS Lab saves time by leaving shaving cream cans under running hot water for 15-20 min or more.
Barbasol has always been the de facto.... That said, I swear they've changed their formula recently. The amount of complaints from models about "eyes burning" has increased dramatically, despite using less shaving cream pies (maybe 2-5 per scene at max?) than years past (15-20 back in the good ol' days!). Or, alternatively, millennials are whiners blah blah blah....
ANYTHING with menthol, "sensitive skin," or similar... will burn outright. I've made that mistake a few times. Those extra chemicals are not your friend.
On the flip side.... Cool Whip in America no longer has any diary left, so you can leave that stuff out for hours and it NEVER turns to soup. I'm not saying the SS Lab will be all real pies anytime soon (too much cost and storage space), but we're getting closer.
ANYTHING with menthol, "sensitive skin," or similar... will burn outright. I've made that mistake a few times. Those extra chemicals are not your friend.
Interesting. I've made it a point to always use sensitive skin shaving cream for pies since i had heard it's easiest on the eyes. Time to switch things up i guess.
A lot of mixed opinions about Gillette. We need to settle this. Will someone in UK get one of each of the 3 or 4 types of Gillette foam and test them ? Sounds as if red and black is best and sensitive skin is watery