What You’ll Need:
Tall Narrow Wood Loaf Mold
10.5 oz. Canola Oil
.8 oz. Castor Oil
9 oz. Coconut Oil
9 oz. Palm Oil
7.8 oz. Olive Oil
.8 oz. Pumpkin Seed Oil
1.2 oz. Shea Butter
5.4 oz. Sodium Hydroxide Lye
11 oz. Distilled Water (15% water discount)
2.5 oz. Pumpkin puree
Titanium Dioxide
Brown Oxide
Tangerine Wow! Colorant
Yellow Oxide
1.1 oz. Pumpkin Spice Fragrance Oil
If you’ve never made Cold Process soap before, check out our FREE four part SoapQueen.tv series on Cold Process Soapmaking, especially the episode on lye safety. Bramble Berry also carries a wide range of books on the topic, including Soap Crafting. You can also checkout the digital downloads.
SAFETY FIRST: Suit up for safety! That includes goggles, gloves and long sleeves. Make sure kids, pets, and other distractions and tripping hazards are out of the house or don’t have access to your soaping space. Always soap in a well-ventilated area.
COLOR PREP: To make sure the Titanium Dioxide blends smoothly into the soap, we recommend micronizing it beforehand. This is an optional step, but it does help prevent the Titanium Dioxide from clumping. To micronize the colorant, use a coffee grinder to blend the colorant to break up any clumps of color and prevent streaks of white from showing in the final soap. Next, mix 1 teaspoon of the colorant into 1 tablespoon of a lightweight liquid oil like sweet almond oil. Then mix 1 teaspoon of the Yellow Oxide, Brown Oxide and Tangerine Wow! into 1 tablespoon of a light oil. Use a mini mixer to smooth any clumps of color.
MOLD & TOOL PREP: Using freezer paper, line the Tall Narrow Wood Loaf Mold. Make sure the shiny side is facing up. To learn how to line the mold, click here.
ONE: Carefully and slowly add the lye to the water and stir gently until the lye has fully dissolved and the liquid is clear. Set the lye and water aside to cool.
TWO: Melt and combine the canola oil, coconut oil, olive oil, castor oil, pumpkin seed oil, shea butter and palm oils. Make sure to fully mix and melt the palm oil before adding it to your oils. When the lye water and the oils have cooled to around 130 degrees or below, and are ideally within 10 degrees of each other, add the lye water to the oils. Stick blend the oil and lye until it reaches thin trace. If you’d like a firmer bar of soap that releases faster from your mold, you can add sodium lactate to the cooled lye water mixture. Use 1 teaspoon of sodium lactate per pound of oils in your recipe. In this recipe, you’d add about 2.5 teaspoons of sodium lactate total.
THREE: When the soap is at light trace, separate about 6 oz. of soap into a small container. Put 1/4 tsp. of the dispersed brown oxide colorant and about half of the fragrance oil. It’s fine to eyeball the fragrance amount. Stick blend the brown soap to a medium to thick trace.
FOUR: When the soap is the correct consistency, pour it into the mold. Tap your mold on the counter to evenly distribute the soap and disperse any air bubbles.
FIVE: To the remaining soap, add the pumpkin puree. Stir the pumpkin in with a whisk.
SIX: Measure about 300 mL of soap into two separate containers. To the soap leftover in the original bowl, add 1.5 Tbs. of the dispersed titanium dioxide. Use a whisk to fully incorporate. Pour about a quarter of the white soap slowly into the mold. Pour carefully so the white soap doesn’t break through the brown soap.
SEVEN: To one of the small containers, add 1/2 tsp. dispersed yellow oxide and 1/2 tsp. of the dispersed brown oxide, and mix well with a whisk. Add the rest of the fragrance to the dark brown color. In the last container, add 1 tsp. dispersed Yellow Oxide and 2 tsp. of the dispersed Tangerine Wow! Colorant and mix well with a whisk.
EIGHT: Start pouring the orange and brown soap in the mold from about 6 to 10 inches above it. Allow the colors to break into the white colored soap. Pour from various heights to help the orange and brown soap break through. This creates the drop swirl effect.
NINE: Continue to pour all three colors of soap until a little bit of soap is left in each container. Make sure to keep enough white soap to cover the entire top. Tap the mold on the counter to pop any air bubbles.
TEN: Slowly and carefully pour the remaining white soap over the top. Next, pour thin lines of orange and brown soap down the length of your mold. The lines don’t need to be perfect!
ELEVEN: Put the tip of a chopstick or dowel into the very top layer of the soap. Drag the swirling tool across the top of the soap width wise in an “S” shaped curve. Next, drag the swirling tool down the length of the mold. Spray with 99% isopropyl alcohol to help prevent soda ash.
TWELVE: The pumpkin puree has natural sugars that can overheat the soap. To prevent this, put the soap in the freezer for 5-24 hours. Then, take the soap out of the freezer. Let it sit in the mold for 3-4 days and then umold. Cut the soap into bars and allow to cure for 4-6 weeks. Enjoy!
