Cucumber Purée

[Jersey Girl]

I made a soap with cucumber purée about a month ago. I tried a test bar the other day and it has a grainy feel to it like a slight exfoliation. Is this normal? I puréed it until it was very liquid and then strained the juice and used that as part of the water and then dumped what was left in the oils and stick blended it. It almost feels like very very fine ground oatmeal would feel. I’ve never used cucumber purée before this, but have used pumpkin and didn’t have this result.

 

[Obsidian]

Did you leave the skin on? I bet that could be scratchy.

 

[Jersey Girl]

Did you leave the skin on? I bet that could be scratchy.

Im pretty sure I peeled it but there may have been a little left on. I should have kept better notes. That could be it.

 

[AliOop]

I'm curious, does one scrape out the seeds before making the puree? They are pretty soft, but seem like they would make scrubby bits if left in.

 

[Jersey Girl]

I'm curious, does one scrape strain out the seeds before making the puree? They are pretty soft, but seem like they would make scrubby bits if left in.

Bingo! I did not scrape the seeds out! That’s is probably the culprit. I don’t mind the soap like it is. It’s a very fine slightly grainy texture so it’s lightly exfoliating but I was racking my brain trying to figure it out. We have a winner. Ding ding ding!

 

[The_Phoenix]

I've been thinking of doing a cucumber puree soap. What effect did it have on the properties of the soap?

 

[Jersey Girl]

I've been thinking of doing a cucumber puree soap. What effect did it have on the properties of the soap?

I used It because I had a whole load of cucumbers coming from my garden all at once. You can only make so many jars of pickles. Lol. Other than the slightly scrubby effect from the seeds that I apparently didn’t remove I don’t see a big difference between it in my other soaps. I don’t think there’s any sugar in cucumbers so it wouldn’t bring the benefits other purées may. I made seven bars and had a little batter left over so I made one bar in a single cavity mold. That one has a little yellow spot of DOS on it. I don’t know if it’s because that one did not gel like the one in the wooden mold did as all the other bars from the loaf mold look fine. That is enough though for me to not use purées again. I did make a soap with pumpkin purée 7 months ago and that is still fine. It also gelled.

 

[cmzaha]

I used It because I had a whole load of cucumbers coming from my garden all at once. You can only make so many jars of pickles. Lol. Other than the slightly scrubby effect from the seeds that I apparently didn’t remove I don’t see a big difference between it in my other soaps. I don’t think there’s any sugar in cucumbers so it wouldn’t bring the benefits other purées may. I made seven bars and had a little batter left over so I made one bar in a single cavity mold. That one has a little yellow spot of DOS on it. I don’t know if it’s because that one did not gel like the one in the wooden mold did as all the other bars from the loaf mold look fine. That is enough though for me to not use purées again. I did make a soap with pumpkin purée 7 months ago and that is still fine. It also gelled.

Dos will not appear immediately and will usually take more than a month unless it touched metal. It could have even been a spot of unmixed fragrance or a halo from a piece of the seed. I have used many purees during my years of soaping with no DOS issues. I always found that cucumber juice added a tad of astringent properties to the soap like Grapeseed oil would do but without the DOS issues of Grapeseed oil.

As for pickles I used to fill up a 10-gallon stoneware crock with cucumber & onions when my dad had a bumper crop of cucumbers to make bread and butter pickles. They never went to waste around my house. But it was a lot of work.

 

[Jersey Girl]

Dos will not appear immediately and will usually take more than a month unless it touched metal. It could have even been a spot of unmixed fragrance or a halo from a piece of the seed. I have used many purees during my years of soaping with no DOS issues. I always found that cucumber juice added a tad of astringent properties to the soap like Grapeseed oil would do but without the DOS issues of Grapeseed oil.

As for pickles I used to fill up a 10-gallon stoneware crock with cucumber & onions when my dad had a bumper crop of cucumbers to make bread and butter pickles. They never went to waste around my house. But it was a lot of work.

I canned a bunch of bread and butter pickles and then made some refrigerator dills. I love pickles but I’m the only one who eats them in my house it seems!

 

[kevenaeakin]

I'm curious, does one scrape out the seeds before making the puree? They are pretty soft, but seem like they would make scrubby bits if left in.

hi I make cucumber and aloe soap quite often. I take the skin and the yellow from the allo, and I always try to use young cucumber. I pulverise everything but the stem end. Then I push it through a fine sieve until I have gotten basically fibre left and not very much of it at that. Then I freeze it 4 future use and my soap is very smooth.

 

[TAS]

I really like cucumber and buttermilk soap. I've never gotten any scratchy consisitancy from it. I don't peel (you will get tiny green specks, but I like that look). What I do is wash the cucumber. cut off the ends, cut it up into 1-2 inches, weigh it, dump it in my VitaMix, weigh out equal amount of buttermilk and puree. I have not mixed my lye into it. I do H2O for the lye and dump the cucumber/buttermild into my soap pot. I just finished four batches of Bear/Beef/Lard and Avocado and the soap is really nice.