100% OO - Super Hard & Brittle

[mercury52]

Did a test the other night for my first ever 100% olive oil batch. Went with unscented and uncolored, just to see the virtues of a 100% OO bar. Small 2 lb batch.

I did a 5% SF, and did a 1.5:1 Water:Lye ratio.

The batch was made on Friday night and has been sitting in the mold until today (Tuesday). Last night before bed, it was still looking fairly soft.

Today, it is hard as a rock! It popped out of the mold with no trouble, and was nearly impossible to cut! The "bars" are also quite brittle and didn't cut evenly. There's lots of general breaking apart.

The closest other batch I've made to this was a 72% Olive Oil batch with 23% CO, and 5% Cocoa butter. That one had a lye solution with a 1.8:1 Water to Lye, and came out absolutely great.

I did the water discounts to help make up for the high amount of OO, knowing that otherwise the bars would be soft and take forever to cure.

So my guess is that the 1.5:1 ratio for this 100% batch was just a bit TOO low. Am I correct in that thinking?

This is literally the hardest bar I've ever made, when it should have been one of the softest. I've done lots of other recipes with varying blends of hard/soft oils and butters.

Anything else I may be missing?

Thank you!

 

[The Efficacious Gentleman]

I found that my Castile (100% oo soap) was brittle when cutting it. I think that there might well be a sweet spot between too soft and too hard.

I did freeze mine to prevent gel which then threw the timing to the wind generally

 

[cmzaha]

With a 40% lye solution you should have de-molded and cut the next day, not 4 days later

 

[mercury52]

Thanks for the tips. I didn't insulate this one, and it didn't go through gel or partial gel.

The very top of the surface still seemed quite soft (it would hold a fingerprint with a soft touch) for those first few days, which is why I didn't unmold sooner.

With most of my recipes, I unmold after 1-2 days and have no trouble cutting.

With this one it literally was looking/feeling too soft to unmold for the first 3 days, and then all of a sudden it was beyond ready.