Rebatching Salt Bars - a mostly picture-free tutorial :)

Sometimes when things go wrong, I just don't want to document that I've had a "learning opportunity".  I regret that choice in this case, because I learned a lot through my salt bar mishap.  I will try to paint you pictures with words for this tutorial.

I made a loaf of salt bars one weekend morning.  I knew they'd be ready to cut in 2-5 hours, but I had only 2.5 hours before I had to leave for the weekend.  I was using a Brambleberry 5 lb mold with a sliding bottom and a silicone liner so that I had nice, crisp edges.  I slid the soap and liner out of the mold before I truly realized how soft it was!  I tried to maneuver everything back into the mold, but half of the soap ended up sliding up and out of the mold, creating a really tall mess of soap.

Since we were in a hurry to leave for the weekend, I let the soap blob sit and figured I'd think of something when I got home the following day.  I did a lot of research on rebatching salt bars, but I seemed to only find instructions to crumble up the bars and use them in new soap batches.

I decided to try to rebatch in my crockpot, just to see what would happen.  Since I had tried to rebatch only about 30-35 hours after I made the bars, they were not rock hard yet (my recipe is 80% coconut oil, 15% avocado, 5% castor, and 60% salt to oils - I think this lower percentage of salt kept the bars softer a little longer).  I salvaged the half of the recipe that stayed in the same shape as it was poured.  I painstakingly crumbled up the blob, stuck it in a crockpot on high, and let it sit for a half hour.  I didn't add oil or water, since the bars were so fresh.  Checked after a half hour, and it looked exactly like when I first put it in.  Checked in another half hour.  No change.  Kept checking, and *finally* 3 hours later, the soap had completely melted and was in a perfect consistency to put in a mold.  I made sure to mix up the melted soap again before I stuck it in the mold.  A few hours later, it was ready to be cut.

What's cool is that it's very difficult to tell the rebatched salt bars from the original - the soap melted so well there were no textured pieces remaining to give away the fact that it was rebatched!  I don't plan to rebatch salt bars going forward, but it's nice to know it can be done!  I have only tried with relatively soft, fresh soap - I'm not sure whether this would work for older, more cured bars, though - if anyone has tried, I'd love to hear about it!

The soap on the left is the rebatched salt bar - the one on the right is what I was able to salvage before The Rebatch.

The rebatched bars also seem a little less crumbly than the original bars after they've been curing for a few weeks, but otherwise, I don't notice a difference between the two, which is awesome!

~Chrissy

Rebatch Soaps (and some beer soaps for good measure)

I've been really enjoying hot processing my soap lately, so I wanted to show off some of my most recent creations:

This is a Cucumber Wasabi Cilantro fragrance that I HP'd - I wanted to get the flecks of color in the bars, kind of like granite.  I'm pleased with how the purple and green really did accent these bars.

This is a Pink Himalayan Salt bar that I rebatched (post to follow) . I love the color that the salt adds to the bar.

It's time to think about beer soaps.  I have really enjoyed making them in the past, including the Guinness soap I made last year, because beer makes the lather nice and fluffy and gives the soap a great toasted caramel fragrance.  I added white kaolin clay to these two beer soaps for a little extra exfoliation.

It's been a week since I made the Oatmeal Stout soap, and the scent has finally calmed down - I had to put it in the garage while it's been curing because the entire house has started to smell like this soap.  I like the scent, but it was incredibly overpowering at first!

The one uses BB's Oatmeal Stout FO, and has some swirls of activated charcoal. 

I do really like the soap now that the scent has faded.

I also made a berry beer-y soap :)  This one has some raspberry beer that my parents gave to me for soaping and a berry vanilla FO.  I added some pink kaolin clay for color, and I'm in love with how this soap smells and looks.

Even though the round soaps can be a pain to make, I really like how they fit in my hand!

Until later!

~Chrissy

Soap Volcano!!

I took some time this holiday weekend to catch up on some soap ideas I have had drawn out but haven't had time to make.  My first three batches turned out just as I had wanted them to - I'll write a post later when I have time to clean them up and get some good light for photos.  

The troublemaker was the next batch I attempted to make.  My fourth (and last) batch of the night was a remake of a hot process lavender soap with alkanet root.  I make it in my BB vertical mold, because I like that it keeps all of the edges nice and smooth, even though it is hot process.

{warning - this may or may not be a boring post - I didn't think to take any photos of this process, so it's going to be a "pictures with words" post :) }

I had run out of bowls and equipment to infuse my soaping oils with the alkanet root, so I had the brilliant idea to just infuse the alkanet root using my crockpot while I was working on my other soaps.  The infusion went great, although I needed a second pair of hands to help me strain out the alkanet root powder (thanks Kris!).  The oils were super hot, and I put them back in the crock pot to stay warm.  I mixed my essential oil blend and put it the table next to the oils so I didn't forget to put it in the oils.  Two seconds later, I knocked the cup over, and the whole soaping area still smells like lavender.  I suppose it could be worse - it could smell like neem oil!

The oils were HOT, though - around 180 degrees!  Since the soap batter over 200 degrees while it's cooking, I had the brilliant idea to just mix the 170 degree lye mixture with my 180 degree oils to save myself some time.  Luckily, I stayed by the crock pot to clean up after I had stick-blended the lye and oils, because less than 10 minutes later, this mixture of blue-purple beads started to volcano out of the crock pot and spill EVERYWHERE!  So, I yelled for my husband, stirred the soap back down into the crock pot, and took a couple deep breaths.  I also turned the crock pot down to low.

Luckily, the soap in the crock pot kept cooking and went through the normal phases.  It eventually didn't zap, and I got it in the mold without a problem.  I guess all's well that ends well, eh?

I've never seen a soap volcano, though, and I've definitely learned a thing or two from that harrowing experience!  If only I'd had the presence of mind to grab my camera so I could record it for posterity.  Hopefully I don't have another volcano to record...

~Chrissy

New weekend soaps

I am working on a post on the new Soap Hutch mold I got recently to talk all about this amazing multi-purpose mold that Rich made for me.  He has been such a pleasure to work with and great at communicating on details of the mold.  I will get into the features of my great Christmas gift in the blog post I'm working on, but for now, just know it's awesome :)

So, since it has a 9-bar divider function, I wanted to utilize it and also play with a chopstick swirl.  One of the nice things about this mold is that it's 4" tall, so each of the 9 divided sections can hold up to 3 bars of soap, or 27 bars total in one mold!  This means that the bars that I swirled had additional layers of depth and design - I really enjoyed seeing how the middle bar of each 3" block turned out.

The blocks all looked so grey from the activated charcoal I used for one of the colors.

Check out how great the swirls inside look:

And the scent is heavenly (Black Raspberry Vanilla).  I did notice, though, that on the tops of some of the blocks, there was this strange yellow-ish color developing in the white portion.  I'm not sure what caused that, since the color didn't make it through the entire block - it was only on the top bit that was exposed to air.  I really struggled getting the soap blocks out of the mold, because the liner on the bottom of the mold was stuck to the plastic bottom of the mold - it took me forever to separate the liner from the mold.  The swirls turned out so beautifully, though, I will definitely use it again!

I also made a hot process lavender soap in my trusty old crock pot.  I have a lot of trouble getting the tops to look smooth with HP, so I poured it into BB's vertical mold to keep all the sides flat and even.  I colored it with alkanet root infused in olive oil (3 heaping teaspoons in 12 oz olive oil).  I was worried about the color, since it was red-looking when I infused the OO over heat, the color turned a pretty purple when I mixed the soap batter, and it became an ugly grey color when it was cooking in the crock pot.  I wish I had thought to take pictures of the colors.  I will make another batch soon and will take pictures to show off the weird color morphing.

The final color ended up pretty great, though - I apparently was having a purple weekend, which was fitting that the Prince station on Pandora was my soaping music :)  I love purple and the Purple One!

I love this color - you can see the change from when it was first cooked (in top left) over a few days curing.  Gorgeous, if I do say so myself!

I need to work on a few more blog posts on the Soap Hutch mold as well as a salt soap I could finally make with the divider mold.  Expect more soon!

Happy Monday - 

~Chrissy

Shaving Soap Recipe

My husband and I gave my dad a shaving set for Christmas last year.  When I started making soaps, I really wanted to learn how to make shaving soaps for him to use with his brush and razor.  These are great holiday gifts for the men (and women!) in your life - using the shaving soap with a brush not only gives a really creamy, stable lather, which is useful for shaving, but the brush makes the hairs stand up (on face, or even on legs) to get a closer shave.  I've made the soap in mugs I found at Goodwill and attached a shaving brush I found at Walgreens for a cute holiday gift for friends and family.

I make my soap in the crockpot, with a mix of sodium and potassium hydroxide.  Here's the recipe I use, found here:

165g Beef Tallow
165g Stearic Acid
100g Coconut Oil
70g Castor Oil

180g Distilled Water
65.6g Potassium Hydroxide
25.2g Sodium Hydroxide

1 Tbsp bentonite clay
1 fl oz FO - My last batch was BB Earl Grey Lemon FO, both men and women like the scent (and even one of my dogs :) )

When the oils are combined and the lye water solution is added, the soap batter gets thick quickly.  I usually use a spatula to mix, rather than my trusty stick blender.  I add the bentonite clay after the batter is thoroughly mixed, because the bentonite clay LOVES water and will thicken the batter up considerably.  Then I dump in a crock pot on low and wait for 1-3 hours until it's fully cooked. Even though these are hot-process, I like to let them cure for at least a week before using.

I have made the soap in BB's column mold, but it's extremely hard to unmold, because the soap is more of a very soft soap, almost a cream soap.  It's firm enough to keep its shape, but the users of the soap may find it easier to use if it's poured directly into a mug or saucer to make using the brush easier.

Since the bentonite clay loves water, you'll have to work a little bit and keep wetting the brush, but the lather is amazing.  Check it out :)  It will stay for a really long time on your face / legs, too!

Even my dad loves the soap:

I've been keeping myself busy the past couple days with the new Soapmaker 3 software I got for an early birthday present.  The CPA in me is really enjoying getting my inventory and recipes documented and figuring out exactly how much each of my soaps is costing me (and my wasted batches, like the lye-heavy batch from the last post).

~Chrissy

Hot Process, part deux

OK.  Yesterday was kind of a stressful day.  Maybe I've just been worrying about my wedding in about 10 days, or because I haven't slept well in a few days (due to poor Hobbes' non-stop intestinal distress), or I just was having a worrying day in general, but I thought making some soap would help calm me down and set me back on track.

So, I decided to make the following soaps:  re-try the hot process recipe from yesterday's post, make a vertical-mold white and blue soap with BB's Fresh Snow fragrance, and try out some natural colorants with BB's Applejack Peel FO.

Let's start with the first soap I made - the hot process soap, part two:

 I made the soap using the same recipe as the first batch, but I resized it to fit my 2 lb loaf mold, rather than put it in the cavity molds like I did last time.  I also used less ultramarine blue to try to get the soap to be more purple-y.  I loved the color in the crock pot!  I also used some sodium lactate to try to get it to harden better.

Hooray!!  It set up overnight!!  I was able to unmold it this morning, and snap this pic with the very early light in the dining room today.  The color lightened up significantly, but I still like it.  And I really like the lavender / bergamot EO scents I used.  The top is kind of rough-looking, but the sides really surprised me with how flat and clean they turned out to be.  I may try to do this more often!

Now for the trouble soaps.  Soap #2 - I wanted to make a Celine swirled soap (see blog of the inventor of this swirl here).  I have some madder root and burdock root that I've been wanting to play with, so I did an infusion of each in olive oil.  2 tbsp of madder root in 1 cup of olive oil and warmed in the microwave, and 4 tbsp of burdock in 1 cup of olive oil and warmed in the microwave.  The burdock root made a light green, so I may have to play around with that some more to see if I can get it to be a more distinctive green, but the madder root was a beautiful color.

I was talking with my fiance and soaping and not really paying a ton of attention to what I was doing, apparently, because after I had swirled and finished the soap, OH CRAP, I forgot to put in the FO.  Ugh.  So, it's now a red, green and white swirled soap that is naturally colored and unscented.  

 Here it is swirled and in the mold.  I think it will look beautiful, and I got to play with colorants, so it's not a wasted soap!

Here's what the colors looked like - I remembered to take a photo only after I had started to pour the soap into the mold.  Madder root on the top right, burdock in the lower middle, and plain uncolored soap on the top left.  Will post pics of the cut soap later.

Soap #3.  I had in mind to make a beautiful swirled soap with BB's Fresh Snow fragrance oil using the vertical mold and slowly twisting the divider as I pulled it out of the mold.  I mixed the oils and put some super pearly white mica in the oils before I added the lye, to see how it would look.  Here is the beautiful pearly oil mix in the pot:

I then added the lye, divided into two parts, and added a tiny bit of ultramarine blue in one part to color it a delicate, shimmery blue.  I stick blended, and got the help of my fiance and  poured into the divided vertical mold. I twisted the divider and felt awesome about how the top looked.

Are you noticing something *missing*?  YES.  THE FRAGRANCE.  AGAIN.  So, instead of having 2 unscented soaps tonight, I scented the leftover soaps that didn't fit in the vertical mold, poured the contents of the mold into the pot and did an in-the-pot swirl.  Poured it back in the vertical mold again and the leftovers into cavity molds.  I am really disappointed.  What was supposed to be sparkly and delicately swirled, like fresh fallen snow, looks muddy.  I like the smell, though, and it was another new recipe, so it will likely be a "tester" batch for my squeaky-clean team of feedback providers.

What a night!  I am glad I have to wait a few days to unmold this one, because I don't think I can look at it right now. Maybe in a few days I will be better able to evaluate this one.  I know we should always have plan B's when soaping, and not to get too attached to a design, and this was a tough lesson for me.

Better luck next time!

~Chrissy

What did I do wrong? Hot Process Edition

I wanted to try a crock pot Hot Process soap, since I received this lovely beauty from my friend Andrea:

 It's a well-loved crock pot, and it came at a great price - free! 

Hobbes always needs to be involved in my photos.  He's a very curious dog...

Last Wednesday, I did some research online, read the chapter on Hot Process a number of times in my The Everything Soapmaking Book, and decided to have a go.  I tried the recipe on page 149 fr dry skin, since I had all of the ingredients for the soap itself.  I colored it with ultramarine blue and ultramarine purple and scented it with Lavendar and Bergamot EO.

I probably should have tried this when I was less pressed for time - I had to run to a volleyball game and had just enough time for the soap to cook and to get it in a mold.  Since I was running late, I didn't think to take photos of the soap while cooking, but I did stir it a few times as it cooked.

Here's what it looked like when I glopped it in the molds:

Love how it smells, but the color is a little too blue.  I also think it looks a little grainy.  It tested as neutral, I got it pressed down and went to my game (which we ended up losing.  Tough night!).

Today, nearly a week later, the soap is still really soft and I can sculpt it and mold it around.  It won't come out of the molds, so I took a knife to try to loosen the edges.  I can scoop the soap out in scoops:

It still smells great, and I still think it's too blue, but I have no idea what happened...  Did I not wait long enough to unmold?  Does it need to set for longer than a week?  I measured everything in ounces as per the recipe, so I'm sure it wasn't as precise as if the recipe was in grams.

I've never made hot process before, so any thoughts would be appreciated! 

~Chrissy