Teach Soap

Just tried making my first batch of whipped soap. I was really excited but managed to keep lye in fridge all day to keep cold! Made a mix of 80% hard oils and 20% liquid oils (as per advice seen all over the net!). Seemed to be okay, but forgot to add fragrance so added it after splitting batch and colouring them. According to what I've read you get plenty of time to work with mixture but I found mixture had set almost solid. Managed to get whisk back through and soften it a bit, but had to handball it into mould and try and squash it down. Don't know if the problem was the fragrance but will try the next batch without any, just to check my technique. any tips or advice would be gratefully received. Don't know how this batch will turn out, hope I can still use it for me and my daughters. Feel really inept after seeing how easy some people seem to do it on Youtube!

Whipped soap is not as easy as people have you believe. Go take a look at Nizzy's whipped soap on the web. http://nizzymoulds.com/Whipped/index.htm

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

Hi Irena, thanks for the swift response. I had a look at Nizzy's site and I seem to have followed everything ok, I just wonder if it was the fragrance? I'm still going to keep on experimenting, I've bought soap from a website, which I love, and when I look at it there are little air bubbles in it and the consistency is very different from my usual CP soaps, so I guess she's making whipped soap, and I would really love to be able to do so as well!

Thanks
Joe Soap

I made mine in my Kitchen Aid. I find the stick blender doesn't work as well for this application. Yes, the soap has air whipped into it and is lighter in weight for the same size regular CP bar. Here is a pic. The raw soap was very creamy when I added the fragrance.

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

Hi Irena

I used my hand-held mixer rather than the one on the stand, I didn't use my stick blender. I wonder if I over-whipped it though because the mixture was really stiff before I added the fragrance, or if I should have done a different mix than 80/20. Thank you for sharing your picture, it helps to see how you did it. Can I ask if you did 80/20 or a different ratio?

Here is what I used.
3.5 oz. castor
8.7 oz. coconut
9.7 oz. olive
43.9 oz. of tallow ( I needed to use it up)
A hand blender should have worked similarly. The texture right before I put it in the molds was the consistency of heavy whipped cream.

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

Hi Irena

Your soap looks beautifully soft and creamy - exactly what I hoped to achieve, till I got a solid mass! I've never used tallow in a recipe, and forgive my ignorance, but is tallow lard, or dripping? I've never used it simply because it's an animal fat and I always thought people wanted 'natural', 'organic' etc, but I'm finding out that customers are prepared to try most things, and seem to have a preference for soaps with fragrances rather than essential oils. My recipe was:

65g Castor
450g Palm
325g Coconut
200g Shea Butter
200g Olive Pomace
80g Apricot Kernal

I've unmoulded the soap this morning and I am very surprised that it looks a little bit better than I thought it would. The colours have taken well, the consistency is smoother than I thought, but it is obviously still very rough and lumpy - definitely only one for testing with at home! I did test it though, and it floats!!

Tallow comes from beef fat. In mexican stores it's called Manteca. I've never used apricot kernel oil in soap, so I can't tell you how the soap will behave. Could you reformulate your recipe and try it without it?

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

Hi Irena
I'll give it a whirl without the apricot kernal and see how I go. But I am chuffed to bits that I made my standard recipe CP soap today, poured the mix into silcone cake cases and waited for the mix to become firmer and piped it on top - voila! So I will try that again, as well as making the base with standard CP and trying the topping with the whipped soap. I can't wait to unmould my soaps tomorrow to see how they've turned out. x

Good luck on your next batch!

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

Made my second batch of whipped cp soap and, amazingly, it turned out beautifully. After my previous disaster I made my normal soap batter for cupcake bases, then the whipped batter for the topping - and they look pretty good. Piping skills could be improved upon, but on the whole delighted! Might try the whipped batter for everything next time

I did a blend of Rose Geranium, Frankincense & Palmarosa essential oils - my all time favourite, and it didn't let me down! The first batch I did with a fragrance oil, can't even remember which one now. But I also did a batch of RTCP today and used a rose fo and it completely riced on me. I love my essential oils, but wish I could rely on fo's not to seize or rice, as there are so many fabulous smells out there. I buy them for my M&P soaps and bathbomb cupcakes.

Glad it worked out not sure why the first one did not. I love making it only thing is unmolding it I hate so thinking about taking a piping class lol.

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