I use a non-peanut butter spread on the sandwich that looks like peanut butter. I think it's sunflower or some other nut spread that I get from Trader Joes or healthfood stores.

Yea, good idea. One brand is called "Sun Butter" and is available at my local supermarket.

In the fine print of my contract, I include a line that says something like, "For those with peanut allergies, a trick using a peanut butter jar may be used. However, it contains absolutely no peanut butter, nor has it ever."

Tony Thomas, your custom made set looks great.

I have found that although some materials can easily be wrapped into a tube, it may not remain circular. To solve this problem, at the top, I attached this material to a circular disk (e.g.; the plastic top from a margarine "tub"). This would keep the cylinder completely round. It has the additional benefit of keeping prying eyes, out.

John

Since I've had my new multiplying bottles from Jef Eaton, it's become obvious that MB can be the exact same routine as PB&J, except that loads and loads of extra bottles appear. It's MUCH easier to perform, has every single gag and element that PB&J has, but is far, far more engaging, funnier, plays longer, and is way more magical.

I can't tell you how much fun I'm having with MB. The best investment I've made in a long time.

All these years, I've been performing PB&J, when the real deal is Multiplying Bottles.

I can't vouch for other products, but Jef's MB are a cinch to work with, and really stunning props. Produce the bottles easily, in any order, at any time. Almost no practise is required (I thought I needed to carefully plan out the routine, but that ain't so...)

Make those bottles appear as fast as you like. Change the pace up, according to your audience. And the really nice thing is, you can fit a standard can of beans or other product into the prop.

Great entertainment: silly, funny, can use a kid helper, strong magic (really, if you get the handling right), and simple to perform.

I'll never perform PB&J again, as long as I have my fantastic Multiplying Bottles.

Potty

Great idea John.

I recently purchased Peanut Butter Jammed by Fab Magic.... I LOVE it no worries about the tube sticking and you get a great ready to go routine with extra props...
It is worth checking out here

http://www.fabmagic.com/pebujejaimfa.html

I hope you like it as much as I do and Rick is great to work with...

I have used the multilplying bottles for a couple of seasons in my hotel show, done to music. The one issue that made them leave ths show was simply a matter of logistics: you end up with a table full of bottles that needs to be moved away and then stored (reset) in a variety of situations. The trick was not practical in the end.

I wonder how you deal with that issue, in a kid show environment, Potty. I had a folding plastic sheet cover that was placed over the 9 bottles in the end, and the whole table was wheeled away. But in a kid show ,there is no "away".

The MB is one of those tricks that fascinate the performer more than the audience - after retiring the set, I brought the trick back in form of a passe-passe routine - with less bottles and still played over 3 minutes to music.

Curiously, I´ve been considering the PBJ routine for a while now, for my kid show, but we do not have PB in jars like that on the island where I live. So I found other jars that can be made to look like mayo, etc, but not a single product that comes in a suitable jar to make the PB gimmicks. I would have to create a jar that the kids are not familiar with.

Thus, I might give it a try to prepare a version such as described by Potty above, but built around the passe-passe idea: essencially, the PBJ routine with the added touch of removing the "accidentally exposed" extra bottle and still being able to do the trick in the end.

Rolf, it's very simple: put a tray on the table before you start the routine, and when it's over, simply lift it up, with all the bottles atop, and put it aside.

Rocket science, that isn't!

;)

I actually used a narrow tray for my assistant to bring the bottles onto the stage. The tray also doubled as an elevated platform where the effect took place (can be seen on my promo vid for a few seconds). However, for the hotel shows the idea of removing a tray at the end was impossible, mostily because my assistant often has to squeeze through curtains to get on-offstage and it was already difficult enough to keep the two tubes, one bottle and one glass balanced without dropping anything. That is why at the end we just covered them up and wheeled the table to a side of the stage. We would do the bottles near the end of the show, and when finished, the stage would normally be taken by the animation team and filled with dancing kids - so we had to strike rapidly and again, the bottles where a hindrance.

I think the bottles will not make it into my typicall kid show, but your post gave me the inspiration of doing the passe-passe bottles again, on the stage shows, but emplyoing a volunteer onstage. I had never considered that possibility, and have never seen it done - it is an idea with good potential. I am beginning to see how to construct an ending for the bottle routine, something that it has always lacked.

Rolf, I'm glad that you also like the idea of a volunteer for Passe-Passe, or Multiplying Bottles. I always want to try to involve a kid helper, whenever I can, and this seemed like a logical solution. I've also found that, once I have a kid volunteer, all the other kids are much more keen to "follow" the bottle.

My routine is still very much in the early stages of development - but one thing I've noticed, when at the end, the kid magicks up a "baken bean and dragon snot sandwich", ALL the kids want me to eat it! So far, I've said that I need to keep it for the Captain (it actually contains Baked Beans, and black "slime"). But I think there's great potential to actually take a bite of the sandwich, chew it a bit, and then spit it out.....

Really, having SO much fun with this new prop, but I must get a suitable case to carry the props, or I fear they will get damaged before long.....

Many thanks Mighty Fool!! Naturally, I would agree!! JR