FO's tint or darken my soap....

[Jerry S]

I have a sampler pack of FO’s from Peak Candle supplies. I have used many of these satisfactorily. However, many of these have vanillin in them, which is a vanilla or related extract, which causes my soap to be off white. A letter to them informed me of the ones that contained vanilla or vanillin but they also mentioned that most FO’s tend to darken or discolor when used in soap. Since some of my favorite scents have vanillin I use Titanium Dioxide, which helped a little but still kept me from getting really nice white soap even staying away from Olive Oil and any oil which had a dark color to it.
I also used the trick of just putting it in the colored soap when swirling and that worked pretty well but I wanted to make some pure white soap having a selection of FO’s that didn’t discolor it.
Do any of you out there know of FO’s and who makes them that don’t tend to tint soaps off white. Using TD is my only solution at present but really doesn’t solve my problem.
Any tips along these line will be appreciated..
Thanks
Jerry S

 

[kelleyaynn]

Many FO's discolor soaps (in my experience almost all do to some extent). FO's with vanilla will darken soaps considerably - the more vanilla, the darker the color. If you use vanilla, there isn't much of anything you can do to make the soap really white. Some sites sell an additive that is supposed to help with vanilla darkening, but my understanding is it doesn't work very well.

The only thing you can really do is test different FO's to see which ones are acceptable to you. There is the soap scent review board (you can google it), which does help some, but not always.

 

[soapbuddy]

Vanilla stabilizer for CP soap helps, but over time those soaps will discolor too.

 

[foresthome]

I had a lot of trouble getting a nice white bar, my whitest bar to date actually is 70% Pure Olive Oil, not extra virgin, which gives soap a light green yellow tint, but the big Costco Pure OO. I also heard lard makes a white bar, but I am trying to do mostly vegetable and vegan soaps, so I haven't ever used lard. I haven't tried the Pure OO with the TD, but I bet it would be really white.

 

[Jerry S]

Thank you all for the tips and Foresthome for your comments about using OO. The OO that I use does come from Costco and some of the bars I've made with it stayed really nice and white but ...I didn't use FO's with vanillin in those so they stayed white.
I use TD now when I make soap but I guess I'll just try to stay away from FO's with vanillin.
By the way, I have made really white bars of soap with lard as the main oil, CO, Cas O, but did not scent it. It stayed pure white forever.
Thanks for the tips
Jerry S

 

[judymoody]

I have a number of FOs that have not discolored at all on me but don't have my notes with me right now. The soap scent review board is very helpful in identifying non-discoloring FOs.

Off the top of my head of ones I have soaped, these have not changed color: Peak Rose Bouquet, Peak Sweetpea, Elements Black Vetiver Cafe, Irish Tweed (SGS, I think, or maybe AHRE), BRV (Can't remember if it was Peak or AHRE), WSP Sandalwood.

 

[honor435]

peaks: sweet pea, mandarin plum, white tea ginger, key lime, dont dis, im sure theres more, do you only want white soap? im sure people dont care, as long as its good soap!

 

[Jerry S]

Discoloring FO's in my soap....

Thanks for the tips Judymoody and Honor. Judy, I can probably research those FO's querying Elements, SGS & AHRE....to find out who makes them.

Kim, I just finished making a lot of soap since everything I had is gone due to the Holidays...All of what I just made is colored, swirled with color etc etc. and I just wanted to make some really nice white hard bars with a few of my favorite scents..(thanks to you by the way)''......anyway, the soaps turned out great but my FO's tinted my white bars. Fr. Van. Amber, in particular.
Jerry