When I first started, I went down to Target and bought all the oils that sounded good to me. I bought Olive oil, Coconut Oil, Sunflower Oil, Sesame Oil, Castor Oil and Lard. Then, I just started throwing them together and using SoapCalc to figure out how much Lye to use.
I eventually read that 5 ingredients was the "magic" number (although I still go crazy sometimes and use 8 or more). I eventually added Shea and Cocoa butters to my line up when I felt I had learned enough to justify the money. I don't use lard anymore. My magic 5 are castor (5-10%), cocoa (5-10%), coconut (25-30%), olive (45-55%) & shea (10%). I do use 45%-55% olive but after reading some posts here, I think I may drop that down and see what happens. I wanted to try and see if I could make mine more bubbly this year.
I use a range of % because sometimes I want to do more intricate swirls and sometimes I want a really hard bar.
Regarding palm oil. I did buy some (7lbs from Soaper's Choice) but I've barely used half. I just don't see what it brings to my soap and it seems to speed up my trace something awful.
I eventually read that 5 ingredients was the "magic" number (although I still go crazy sometimes and use 8 or more). I eventually added Shea and Cocoa butters to my line up when I felt I had learned enough to justify the money. I don't use lard anymore. My magic 5 are castor (5-10%), cocoa (5-10%), coconut (25-30%), olive (45-55%) & shea (10%). I do use 45%-55% olive but after reading some posts here, I think I may drop that down and see what happens. I wanted to try and see if I could make mine more bubbly this year.
I use a range of % because sometimes I want to do more intricate swirls and sometimes I want a really hard bar.
Regarding palm oil. I did buy some (7lbs from Soaper's Choice) but I've barely used half. I just don't see what it brings to my soap and it seems to speed up my trace something awful.
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