Teach Soap

Hi all,

Happy Spring!!!!!!!!

I've been on a hiatus from making soap, until today. I wanted to try coconut milk, so I mixed it when it came out of the can (it was seperated when I opened the can) & put it in the freezer. It started to really thicken so I decided to put it on an ice bath & added the lye slowly. The coconut milk started to get clumpy & VERY GOOEY (temp was around 90 degrees). I decided to use it anyway & added to my oils, which were about 90 degrees as well. No problem when I mixed & came to trace nicely. I looked at the soap 2 hours later & it looked fine & was warm to the touch (normal).

Any idea why it became gooey? Has anyone else had this happen with coconut milk, is it normal? Do you think it will have adverse affects on the final product?

Any ideas are much appreciated!

Happy Spring to you too!

What you experienced is normal when mixing coconut milk the way you did. The first time I did that I scorched the coconut milk. Coconut milk has fat and natural sugars. An easier way is to dissolve your lye in an ounce more water than the lye weight, ( just to make sure the lye is all dissolved) and then add the coconut milk for the remainder of the liquid to your cooled down oils before the lye water goes in. Your soap sounds like it will be fine - just make sure it doesn't overheat.

I am not sure what you mean by gooey, but it gets very thick like curdled cream for me. So thick that it is a pain getting it out of my lye pitcher. But it all turns out fine once you mix with a stick blender, at least for me. I have had a couple of batches get "spotty" like there were clots of the coconut milk that didn't fully dissolve, especially with florals. However, those ended up fine too. Just don't use coconut cream. . . ..that seizes pretty immediately for me and I have a big lump at the bottom of my lye pitcher.

If it was me, I would mix my lye with minimum water required, then add the rest of the liquid as coconut milk as soon as the lye water and oils are emulsified.

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

I use coconut milk for my complete water replacement, but I'm making 2 lb batches at this point. One can usually does the trick and if it is a bit short I add a tad of water, not usually necessary. I freeze half of the milk in an ice tray. I weigh the cubes then add room temp coconut milk to make up the desired weight, then add the weighed lye into this when it is time to get started. If it heats up I mix it in an ice bath, but that usually isn't necessary. After adding and mixing with the oils color and fragrance, I mold and put the soap into the refrigerator for a day or two.

PS thanks to soapbuddy I'm soaping with coconut milk!!

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~bytheSEAsoap~ Mella bythesea, bythesea, bythebeautiful sea

海の皂

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

Thanks for all your replies. I'll keep you posted on how it comes out.

Mella, I have a question -

why do you only freeze half of the coconut milk? I want to try this once I am able to soap again and like the method you outline. I figure that the more of the coconut milk I can get in the milk the better my soap might be.

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Susie
Sometimes A Mistake is so much fun, You just have to do it again!

Bubbles. I don't mean to answer for Mella.

I freeze half of my milks also (coconut, goat's, soy, etc) when soaping. Because of the high temperature reached when adding the lye, the milk will tend to scorch if it's not kept cool. It won't overheat if you start with a 50-50 mix of frozen & liquid.

Thanks Super; so lets see if I have this right.... freezing just half of it is enough to keep the temp down. Sounds like a winner to me. Now I just have to find coconut milk and get to the point where I can soap again. Appreciate all of the input!

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Susie
Sometimes A Mistake is so much fun, You just have to do it again!

bubbles 2

I just want to clarify. I use all coconut milk for a 2 lb batch between 33 and 44 percent fat on the can (NOT cream). I freeze half in an ice cube tray the other half I put in a zipplock bag and cool in the refrigerator over night.

On soaping day I put all the frozen cubes in an 8 cup measuring cup I pour the cooled milk into that. Next step is to sprinkle the weighed lye crystals while stirring.

When I was visiting a friend we made this once again. Each time is different in some way isn't it expecially if you don't have your notes or computer with you on vacation! LOL For some reason I thought I should put the measuring cup into a cold bath then the solid cubes then the lye. Well it was so cold it got really lumps and was even refreezing and I couldn't stir! So the initial ice cubes were enough of a cooling effect. Oh yeah to complicate matters we added 2 tsp of honey and ground fine oats. Ah yes this was all happening in the tropics another first for me.

HTH,

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~bytheSEAsoap~ Mella bythesea, bythesea, bythebeautiful sea

海の皂

Thanks Mella.

Sounds like you had some fun! I think that anything that happens in the "tropics" would be ok by me.
I still need to find some coconut milk, also waiting for some molds I ordered and I think I should be soaping by the end of the week or next week. Since you were in the tropics did you look for fresh coconut milk and try that?

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Susie
Sometimes A Mistake is so much fun, You just have to do it again!

I actually had some fresh coconut milk to drink! I use the canned stuff for soap!

Happy soaping and with new molds that grand!

eta spelling and moving smilies

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~bytheSEAsoap~ Mella bythesea, bythesea, bythebeautiful sea

海の皂