Teach Soap

I took the dive and decided to make my own CP soap. My first batch was a trial... I used 250 grams (8.8 oz) of coconut oil and superfatted it to I think it was 15 or 20%, spent ages stirring it with a stick (no stab blender at the time) and added some peppermint FO and roughly 250g of salt when it hit trace.


The end result

Since then I've been having a lot of fun and have been making small 500g (17.6oz) trial batches, making 6 at a time. I use 125g (4.4oz) of coconut oil, 375g (13.2 oz) of oilve and superfatting is about 10%. Done a few plain batches, just FOs and have done 2 batches using cinnamon for colour.




And I've been cutting them in half so I can send them to my 'testers'... I think they look really quite nice


I'm planning on making a carrot and honey bar in the next few weeks and whatever else takes my fancy, why didn't anyone warn us that this stuff is addictive??

they look really good. I think IMHO that a high super fat percentage will cut down the amount of lather your soap will make. Soap is a balance between , moistureizing your skin ,good lather, and a nice hard bar that lasts. unless your making some kind of specialty soap bar. This is just my opinion and certinaly not ment to hurt your feelings.

Those look awesome for your first batches. I don't know if you've used soapcalc.com before but it's a valuable tool. While coconut oil promotes good lather and a nice hard bar of soap, it can dry your skin after showering. Linda Wise is correct that too much superfat will reduce your lather significantly. You may want to try adding some other oils such as olive or palm oil. Keeping your superfat around 5 to 7% is a good basic rule of thumb that I use. Some would disagree but it works well in my recipes. Play around in www.soapcalc.com and see what the different oils will do for you.

And oh yeah.....welcome to the addiction!!!

Welcome!
For CP soap, I use 5-7% superfat as well. Unless it's a 100% coconut soap with 20% superfat, I don't go above 20% as the total of my recipe with coconut oil.

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

I do use SoapCalc, once I fiigured it out I use it everytime I make a new recipe. Due to the limits of been at college I've had to stick with olive and coconut oil (which I buy as a solid block called Copha) but might expand my oils when I get home. For fragnance I've been using cheap discount store oils (which probably have just had a peppermint leaf or cinnamon quill waved over the top) and only using 1%, if that. Again when I'm home I'll be ordering some 'proper stuff', but for now it seems to be working.

Used some cinnamon soap yesterday to see if the FO I used reacted with my skin but it didn't and after I dried off my skin didn't feel dry. I'm also hoping to made a mould so I can do more than 6 bars at at time... but the paper milk cartons I'm using seem to be working.

Hi Toady. Nice to see another Aussie on the site. I have found a fantastic soapers' site which sells just about anything you could possibly want for soaping.
http://www.aussiesoapsupplies.com.au/
They are a West Aussie company, and I've found them extremely useful.
I discovered CP about 10 years ago, and agree with you that it's VERY addictive. Over the past few months, I've been experimenting with M&P. Wow, it you think CP is addictive, you should try this. So much more versatile as far as colours and fragrances go. Also, easier to make novelty soaps, which is why I got into it. I wanted to make some of those lovely cakes and gimicky stuff, plus you don't have to wait so long to use it. I still make CP, but they're both so different, it's a good balance.

Good luck with your addiction
Suzanne

Hey guys - per the original post, what does adding salt at trace do for a batch of soap? I've never done that. I guess I could google it but it's sometimes fun to get a human answer.

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Heather Shoemaker

If you add a lot of salt at trace, you will be making a salt bar. Otherwise you can add a small amount to your lye water.

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

My latest achievement... honey carrot soap.

I pureed the carrots, used a bit of the carrot water and added the lye to it then mixed in the carrots into this, the lye turned the puree into juice which I added to the oils. I put a tablespoon of honey in at trace (that was mixed with some of the oils) and poured into my milk containers moulds. Upon unmoulding I noticed a few small "holes" in one bar, guessing that's where the honey didn't quite blend in fully, but I think they look nice and definately want to try this on a bigger scale.

Toady, I love your carrot/honey soaps. That's one thing I love about CP, the earthiness of them. As much as I love M&P, they are much more "refined" looking, which of course is their nature, and their attraction.
I'm still trying to shrink my pics to post.

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Suzanne
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid= ... 1135479737
http://stuffandnonsense-essebee.blogspot.com/

Having got some skin safe FO's earlier in the week I made a batch on Wednesday and unmoulded them this morning (Fri), forgot to account for the water and made too much for my mould but used the left overs to make 3 'cups'. Here's my lovely Baby Powder


The block which was cut into 8


A 'cup', with a swirl of some kind... thinking parts gelled and parts didn't, or something like that

Congrats on your batch! The siwrls in your cup soap could be stearic acid that precipitated out of one of you soapmaking oils. It should be safe to use though.

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

thats very pretty, no matter what caused it. Partial gel done not look like that.

[quote="Toady"]I took the dive and decided to make my own CP soap. My first batch was a trial... I used 250 grams (8.8 oz) of coconut oil and superfatted it to I think it was 15 or 20%, spent ages stirring it with a stick (no stab blender at the time) and added some peppermint FO and roughly 250g of salt when it hit trace.


The end result


I love these and they look like tapioca pudding, so white and creamy! Two weeks back I did see a soap with a layer that included tapioca in it!

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~bytheSEAsoap~ Mella bythesea, bythesea, bythebeautiful sea

海の皂

Wow Toady, those pearly swirls look great! I'd be telling everyone I did it on purpose.
By the way, are you a Neighbours fan? I believe there's someone called Toady in Neighbours (I'm a Home and Away buff myself, or was. It's getting a bit far-fetched for me lately).

Keep up the good work, and good luck for more happy accidents.

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Suzanne
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid= ... 1135479737
http://stuffandnonsense-essebee.blogspot.com/