# Palette of natural soap colorants - pic heavy



## surf girl

I did a little side-by-side comparison of various colorants, and have photographed the results.  I'll keep these little soapies for a while, to see how they fade or change over a few months.

All the soaps are made with 100% canola (I'm also interested to see if and how badly these suckers DOS).  The powdered additives were at approximately 3/4 tsp ppo; the tomato paste was about 1 1/2 tbsp ppo; the orange 5X was about 1 tbsp ppo. From left to right, the additives are:

rosehip powder, paprika, yellow dock powder, orange 5X 
turmeric, curry powder, tomato paste, control (uncoloured)
elderberry, spirulina, stevia
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For the second set, I used carrot juice as 100% the liquid, and doubled the amount of powdered additives.  I skipped the tomato paste and the orange 5X.

So, from left to right (same order, really), they are:

rosehip, paprika, yellow dock
turmeric, curry, control
elderberry, spirulina, stevia
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.





Here are a few as side-by-side comparisons (carrot juice batch is on the left):

Control:
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Yellow dock:
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Paprika:
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Turmeric:
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## TessC

Very cool, thanks for the pics! Now I want to make some paprika colored soap, that's such a pretty color.


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## LJA

I am LOVING the yellow dock.  I have to get some of that.  Thanks for doing this.  TOTALLY helpful!


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## topcat

Thanks for this surf girl!  Looking forward to seeing how they age too.

Tanya


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## Lindy

I am totally loving the Yellow Dock & the Paprika without the Carrot Juice & the Rosehip Powder too!  Lady that was a whole lot of work and what a great post to let us see the experiment & results.....way cool....


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## Guest

That is a great experiment, thank you for sharing it with us..Nice soaps.

Kitn


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## smellitlikeitissoaps

wonderful experiment, i am looking forward to your end results


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## surf girl

Yeah, I'm loving yellow dock root too - that pink is very pretty.  I'm going to infuse some oil with it, and see what colour I get - and without the speckles.  I want red, but it seems like such a hard colour to get with natural colorants... I haven't tried red reef clay yet (I like food/plant colorants!  ), nor have I tried madder root.  Apparently you can get red from rhubarb root too.


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## Lindy

I am so glad we have you here to do these amazing experiments and then let the rest of us know what you've done and the outcome - good - not so good - indifferent.  All I've seen of your stuff so far is simply - good - good - gooder - good - *OMG I MUST HAVE THAT ONE *- and good......


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## Guest

COOL. A few noob questions though, what does DOS mean? what is control? orange 5X? are these Amercian drinks or something?


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## TessC

DOS is short for dreaded orange spots. There's an article explaining DOS here. 

The controls are her two uncolored bars. They're to give you an idea of what the soap recipe used looks like with no additives.

Orange 5x is an essential oil, also called Orange 5 fold on some suppliers' sites, like this one.


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## Sibi

Thanks sooo much for doing this surf girl!  I love the comparisons, it's so helpful.  I love paprika in my food and now I can use it in my soap too!  I have only one question, some of these spices have pretty strong smells (curry for example), do those smells come through in the finished soap or have you masked them with FOs?  Just wondering.....

Sibi


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## wonderland

this is great.  thanks for posting your research for us.  i'm going to have to get some yellow dock.


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## surf girl

Soap_for_breakfast said:
			
		

> what does DOS mean? what is control? orange 5X? are these Amercian drinks or something?



I know your questions have already been answered, but I had to comment because you made me laugh!  I think they would be awesome drink names.  Might ask my local bartender for a Control and see what he concocts.


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## surf girl

Sibi said:
			
		

> I have only one question, some of these spices have pretty strong smells (curry for example), do those smells come through in the finished soap or have you masked them with FOs?  Just wondering.....



Sibi, I have never been able to smell any of these when I have used them in soap.  When I first mix the powder in a bit of oil, I can definitely smell it, and sometimes right after pouring I can smell them, but not in the final soap (even unscented soap, which these test batches are).

Do note, though, that at least some of these can reportedly be a scratchy if you use too much.  In my fully coloured stevia/spirulina batch, the soap is a little less than perfectly smooth, but not so much that it is bothersome, IMO. I don't think my paprika swirls are scratchy, if I remember correctly.


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## Sibi

surf girl said:
			
		

> Sibi said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I have only one question, some of these spices have pretty strong smells (curry for example), do those smells come through in the finished soap or have you masked them with FOs?  Just wondering.....
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Sibi, I have never been able to smell any of these when I have used them in soap.  When I first mix the powder in a bit of oil, I can definitely smell it, and sometimes right after pouring I can smell them, but not in the final soap (even unscented soap, which these test batches are).
> 
> Do note, though, that at least some of these can reportedly be a scratchy if you use too much.  In my fully coloured stevia/spirulina batch, the soap is a little less than perfectly smooth, but not so much that it is bothersome, IMO. I don't think my paprika swirls are scratchy, if I remember correctly.
Click to expand...


thanks for the info!  Glad to hear the smells go away.  Now I'm gonna have to try my hand at some paprika to experiment.  fun!


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## renaissancemom

that is so helpful. the carrot juice you used as 100 % of the liquid, are you referring to the water in the lye solution relplaced with carrot juice?


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## renaissancemom

another question, what is ppo, that per pound o?


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## topcat

renaissancemom said:
			
		

> another question, what is ppo, that per pound o?



Yep, per pound of oils.... :wink: 

Tanya


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## surf girl

renaissancemom said:
			
		

> the carrot juice you used as 100 % of the liquid, are you referring to the water in the lye solution relplaced with carrot juice?



Exactly.  I blended up four half-sized carrots on the "liquefy" setting, with as little water as I could get away with to make it blend properly. This was for a 1 lb batch.

And yes, ppo is per pound oil.


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## MsBien

F-a-b-u-l-o-u-s, thank you!


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## heartsong

*x*

  thanks a bunch!   

ver nice job and very helpful!  love the rosehips!

for a very nice "dial soap" gold www.fromnaturewithlove.com carried calendula extract. a little goes a long way! 1/8-1/4 tsp ppo gave you light to medium gold. i would think powdered calendula petals would give you about the same thing, just would have to use more ppo.

thanks again!

monet


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## ewenique

Wow, thanks for posting the photo results of your experiment.


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## scrapgabbie

l LOVE the carrot one, l haven't used carrot juice yet, l hate cleaning the juicer    but am going to have to give in soon and do it LOL.

With paprika for colouring...l'm curious, isn't parika 'hot' like chilli? Wouldn't it be an irritant in soap? l love the idea of colouring with it, but have been too scared to try it and am really interested to know if it has any effect on skin being in soap?

ps. not sure if it is just an aussie thing, we have normal paprika and hot paprika here, obviously l wouldn't be using the 'hot' one in soap, but even the mild one gets complaints from my kids if l use it in cooking!


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## surf girl

As far as I know, all of the paprika here is dried up and powdered red pepper (red capsicum, like the green capsicum), not hot pepper (whatever the various hot, red little peppers are that are like chili peppers).  If you put it on your tongue, it is not hot.  So no, it's not hot in soap.


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## GrumpyOldWoman

Wow thanks for sharing your results with us!!
I favs are the spirulina & stevia samples.  

I read that some herbs and spices are not smelly when dry.  But can be pretty strong when you get them wet.  I hear spirulina smells fishy when wet


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## rubato456

*1000 thanks*

this was fabulous, detailed and divine!


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## surf girl

GrumpyOldWoman said:
			
		

> I read that some herbs and spices are not smelly when dry.  But can be pretty strong when you get them wet.  I hear spirulina smells fishy when wet



One of the first soaps I made was a soap whose only added scent was imparted by infusing the olive oil (80% of the oil weight) with cedar "leaves". I coloured about 1 cup (roughly 8 oz) of the soap with around 1/2 tsp spirulina (for a 2-lb batch) - totaling therefore around 1/4 tsp per pound soap. It has no fishy smell when wet.  I don't know what the smell would be like with the higher concentration of spirulina... I will suds up some of the spirulina test bar and let you know!

FWIW, the only additives I have noticed in the above array of soaps, when I have used them in other full batches (spirulina, stevia, paprika, 5X, dock, carrot) are the 5X (obviously) and, in combination with buttermilk, the carrot (nice nutty smell). I have not noticed any scent with carrot alone.

I soaped some red and green pepper purees the other day, and the soaps have a distinctly red-peppery and green-peppery smell.  I suspect they will fade substantially over time.


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## Dixie

Thanks for sharing your hard work!


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## IanT

well i can sum this thread up in just one word ......

AWESOME!!

great idea to do a palette! I love the research-type feel to it   8)  nice job!


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## GrumpyOldWoman

surf girl said:
			
		

> GrumpyOldWoman said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I read that some herbs and spices are not smelly when dry.  But can be pretty strong when you get them wet.  I hear spirulina smells fishy when wet
> 
> 
> 
> 
> One of the first soaps I made was a soap whose only added scent was imparted by infusing the olive oil (80% of the oil weight) with cedar "leaves". I coloured about 1 cup (roughly 8 oz) of the soap with around 1/2 tsp spirulina (for a 2-lb batch) - totaling therefore around 1/4 tsp per pound soap. It has no fishy smell when wet.  I don't know what the smell would be like with the higher concentration of spirulina... I will suds up some of the spirulina test bar and let you know!
Click to expand...


Thanks


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## surf girl

Your post reminded me to suds up the soap - I just did.  I can report that neither the spirulina alone nor the spirulina-carrot had a fishy smell.

As an aside, the carrot one had nicer lather than the canola oil alone.


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## GrumpyOldWoman

surf girl said:
			
		

> Your post reminded me to suds up the soap - I just did.  I can report that neither the spirulina alone nor the spirulina-carrot had a fishy smell.
> 
> As an aside, the carrot one had nicer lather than the canola oil alone.



Thanks for the update 
I'm glad to hear that!  As those colors are very pretty


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## bombus

Great idea! lots of work!

I have a question about your procedure-
did you put your additives in the oils, in the lye mixture, or at trace?


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## surf girl

I put the additives in separate plastic cups (or ceramic ramekins for batch #2), and poured the traced soap into each cup, then mixed.  

Actually, for batch #2, I think I mixed each additive with a tiny bit of olive oil in each ramekin, then poured the traced soap into the ramekins.


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## knicelyr

Surf Girl, 
These are absolutely outstanding!!!

I may borrow some of these ideas


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## tincanac

I like speckles in soap!

I'm a speckler - this is a Cranberry Bran speckle experiment though it was in MP soap - I loved the way it looked!







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This is how it looks when light is shone through it:




SPECKLES rule and I am so glad you posted this experiment - I am going to try and speckle some MP with the stuff you experimented with!


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## chrisnkelley

Oh, that is too awesome!  What a neat thing to try!!


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## xraygrl

> As an aside, the carrot one had nicer lather than the canola oil alone.



I'm guessing that's because of the natural sugar in the carrot. 

TFS, cool experiment!


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## studioalamode

Wow, this was a neat experiment.  Thanks for sharing with all of us!  I'm thinking I'm partial to the ones with the carrot juice...but I love red-orange anything.   They are all beautiful though.


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## whisks

thanks so much for posting the photos, surfgirl!

can i ask where one procures yellow dock root from? a health food shop? and does it possess any qualities which benefit the soap apart from colour?


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## renaissancemom

i ordered my yellow dock root online from mountainroseherbs.com as for its properties i would be interested to know this myself, mountainroseherbs says it can be used as a laxative, so i don't know what other properties it has to offer to soap


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## whisks

a laxative? oh, it must be very cleansing then?


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## soap_rat

Wow, this is great!  I, too, love the dock, and I love the tomato soap!

From your mixing description, I guess this was cold process?  I was surprised, because I really thought that everything green I added to CP turned brown.  Years ago I'd tried spirulina with CP and I remembered it as turning brown, but I guess I remembered it wrong.  I know it was mixed with dill or fennel, so maybe the one turning brown mislead me.

Thanks for the info on the carrot juice in the soaps.  I will try to find cheap carrot juice, or a cheap juicer.  The tomato and carrot juice looks like a nice warm red in the photo, or is it really more of an orange?

How have the soaps held up?   Do the higher amounts of vegetable stuff in the soap (carrot, tomato, green pepper) cause faster decay of the soap?

Thanks again for showing us your research!

PS: Whisks--"very cleansing?"  very funny!


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## Honey B

AWESOME work! (And I LOVE your avatar!) THANKS YOU SO MUCH for these wonderful comparisons. I have a Q, though. What about STAINING the Washcloth??? First time out, I used cocoa powder, and the washcloth
looked very, soiled after. So what do you do about this, or do or did you ever have this problem with your natural colorants? SUCh an amazing research!! (FYI: I was just doing Melt & Pour, so that could have been a factor?
I AM a Newbie, after-all : )


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