Best practices for embedding

[Ravenscourt Apothecary]

I have a fully cured batch of soap, that is, shall we say, 'personal soap'. That is, I don't see myself selling it the way it is.
However, I've been thinking of using it decoratively and embedding it in other batches.
A fellow Etsy seller has inspired me to try it, although normally I don't do fancy things with color, preferring the simplicity of uniform color instead:

So, for someone who's never tried embedding, what are some of the things to keep in mind? Does the trace need to be really thick for the chunks of other soap not to sink all the way to the bottom? Could anyone who has knowledge and experience with embedding share the essentials with me, I'd be much obliged.

 

[TVivian]

Ahhhh V&V she is by far my biggest soaping inspiration! I made my own version of the soap in your picture around Christmas time. I mix my batter until it's pretty thick to prevent the embeds from sinking.

 

[TVivian]

here's mine completely inspired by her soap.

 

[TVivian]

And one more thing and then I'll be quiet haha.. It works better if the embed pieces are new, once they're cured and dry, when you go to slice your soap the embed pieces either crumble or drag through your soap. .. Not pretty I found out the hard way.

 

[Ravenscourt Apothecary]

TVivian,
Looks good! Embedding at thick trace makes sense, but the problem I have with it is that it leaves air pockets.

 

[TVivian]

Well by thick I mean still pourable.. Not so thick that you have to spoon it in.

 

[Ravenscourt Apothecary]

TVivian,
thank you for the info. I can still cut through the cured soap I am thinking of using for embedding, so that shouldn't be a problem, however, I'll keep it in mind that fresh and uncured bits work better overall.

 

[seven]

I just made 2 batches of soap with embeds a week ago. I was using fully cured soap that i chopped to tiny bits for embeds and did not encounter any problem. Mixed till medium trace, just enuff for the embeds to stay there and not sink. Don't forget to weigh your embeds so that you don't end up with too much batter at the end.

I'll post pics later..

 

[Tienne]

Seven, can I ask, when you use fully cured soap pieces as embeds, do you then gel the new soap?

 

[coffeetime]

Ok now I'm worried. I made CP embeds a week ago and then got busy and didn't make the rest of the soap. Do you think they will be too hard? I always CPOP.

 

[TVivian]

Ok now I'm worried. I made CP embeds a week ago and then got busy and didn't make the rest of the soap. Do you think they will be too hard? I always CPOP.

I'm sure they'll work fine! For me the dryer embeds just didn't cut as smoothly as new embeds, but maybe my recipe was hard.. And I use a knife to cut and so maybe that was it too.

 

[coffeetime]

I use a wire harp cutter so hopefully that will work. A good reminder to get on with it though!!

 

[Tienne]

When you have to figure out the amount of oils to use to fill the mold, do you just subtract the total weight of the embeds from the oils or...? How exactly does one go about knowing how much volume the soap embeds will take up?

Is there a "critical mass" of soap scraps one shouldn't go above? Any max amount of soap scraps one can put in before the whole thing falls apart?

Sorry, for hijacking your thread Ravenscourt.

************

ETA: Okay, I've found out how to calculate how much batter to make and the amount of shreds/embeds to use;

http://candleandsoap.about.com/od/soaprecipes/ss/confettishreds_3.htm

 

[seven]

Seven, can I ask, when you use fully cured soap pieces as embeds, do you then gel the new soap?

yes. where i live is already hot, plus i am using a wooden mold. i just left it there and it will gel on its own. it turned out fine.

 

[shunt2011]

I've made soap with old (6+ months old) embeds with no problem. I've taken a batch I didin't like and cut it up in larger cubes then filled my mold with them and added new soap over it and banged it hard to get all the air bubbles out and let it get. Had no problem cutting them at all.

 

[Ravenscourt Apothecary]

Sorry, for hijacking your thread Ravenscourt.

ETA: Okay, I've found out how to calculate how much batter to make and the amount of shreds/embeds to use;

http://candleandsoap.about.com/od/soaprecipes/ss/confettishreds_3.htm

No Problem Tienne, the thread is there for everyone to participate in, if interested. Makes sense about the scaling down thing, great info there. I was basically going to do exactly that - subtract the weight of the embeds and adjust the recipe through the SoapCalc, since I know the weight that normally goes into my molds - but great to have that confirmed.

 

[athallr]

I'm really wanting to give this a try! Looks like so much fun.

 

[Todd_in_Minnesota]

Me too...

I've been saving the shavings from all my soaps for over a year now, from when I smooth off the sharp corners. (It seems wasteful to just toss them out).

I'd sort of intended to use them as embeds, but never really had a clear idea of how. Is it as simple as sprinkling them into a batch of something with a fairly simple color?

Todd

 

[marghewitt]

I've been saving the shavings from all my soaps for over a year now, from when I smooth off the sharp corners. (It seems wasteful to just toss them out).

Todd

I give all my scraps and shavings to a friend who wets them and then presses them down into his shaving mug. He says he loves it for shaving even though it's not shaving soap.

 

[grayceworks]

I save all my shavings too. When I get a couple pounds of them, I make confetti soap by chopping them all up in tiny pieces, and mixing them in at heavy trace on my oatmeal soap.