Goat Milk...to burn or not?

[Spice]

I made my first full batch of goat milk soap. I made a tester earlier last week, it was not as white as I thought it would be. The temp for the test was right abut 80 degrees. Was an 18 0z batch. I keep the raw milk in a bath of ice water. Used Lavender eo, nice for the first time.

Tonite, I decided to jump right in and make a 53 0z batch. Defrosted the gm placed it in an ice bath and was pouring 1 tlb spoon at a time and waited 10 mins between pours. My temp after pouring in the lye was 80 degrees, max. I never got pass that mark. It took, I used 8.1 0z of lye to 15.4 0z of gm, 4 hours to mix the lye and gm. When at the last 3 tlb spoon, I got impatient, I poured a tlb and a half.......I shot myself in the foot. I immediately, smiled the ammonia and I knew that I had burned or did something to the milk.

My take on this is that the gm milk, becomes overwhelmed with the lye and reacts, kind of like in shock. I am also thinking that maybe I should have gone even less there at the end because of all the lye in the gm. Will try another batch in a couple of days. What do people do with lye solution that can't be used?

 

[Obsidian]

Your milk wasn't burned. The ammonia smell is normal when using milk, it will go away with a cure.
Burned milk will turn bright orange or even brownish.

Unusable lye solution should be diluted and poured down a drain, not a toilet.
Take a big bucket, fill with water then add your solution. Slowly pour it down the drain with cold water running.

Your solution is usable though, no reason to throw it out

 

[lsg]

I freeze the milk in a plastic bag so I can flatten it out. It is easier to break it up and use it frozen. You will still need to put the frozen milk container in an ice water bath and add the lye a little at a time, but 4 hours is way too much time to take to mix lye and milk.

 

[Primrose]

It never takes me more than 5-10 minutes to mix my lye into my goat milk.

The ammonium smell is normal and will fade during the cure. The milk may turn yellow or orange but isn't necessarily scorched just heated up a bit. When it scorches it turns brown

 

[NsMar42111]

Why were you putting in so little at a time? Curious if you read that somewhere, I've never heard of doing that.

As everyone said, milk soaps stink for a bit...if you've never made soap that's why I highly recommend not doing milk as the first ones so you can get the process down before dealing with other variables.

Lye is a drain cleaner, find a slow drain and clean it! It'll etch the toilet, not recommended. But the solution is fine to use so make another batch instead

 

[amd]

Adding lye to GM over the course of 4 hours, I imagine you run the risk of saponifying the milk fats at a higher rate than if you did it over the course of a few minutes. You can add the lye a tbsp at a time, but stir until dissolved before adding the next tbsp. No need to wait minutes for the next addition. If you are starting with frozen milk, or even partially thawed milk, you shouldn't run the risk of burning it. If using cold milk (e.g. just out of the fridge) you'll want to keep it in an ice bath. If using room temp milk (e.g. canned or reconstituted from powder) you'll need the ice bath and to go slowly. I make GM soap from a can about once a year, but I put the milk in the fridge for 24 hours before I use it and put it in an ice bath. (This is fiddly for me and that's why I only do it once a year!)

 

[IrishLass]

I like to use the 'split method' when making goat milk soap. Much less fussy for me and the soap comes out a nice off-white, creamy color, just the same as with the more painstaking 'frozen method'. Also- the initial ammonia smell with the 'split-method' is so muted/mild that it's practically non-existent.

For what it's worth, the 'split method' involves dissolving the lye for your batch into an equal amount of water in weight, and then adding the remainder of your batch's liquid amount as fresh (either refrigerated or room temp) goat milk directly into the melted oils either before or just after adding the lye.

Although this will only provide one with a roughly 25% - 30% goat milk soap, you can make a 100% goat milk soap with the spit-method by fortifying your fresh goat milk with enough powdered goat milk to bring the milk concentration up to where it needs to be in order to equal out to a 100% goat milk content, i.e., if you needed 4 oz. of your batch water to dissolve your lye, just add enough powdered GM to your fresh goat milk amount that would normally turn 4 oz of water into fully reconstituted goat milk (then add that into your melted oils).

The reason I prefer using the split-method over the 'frozen milk' method is because I'm one of those that hates dissolving my lye into anything but water. Less troubles and fuss/muss for me that way.


IrishLass

 

[lsg]

IrishLass, I use the split method when I use cow's cream for part of the liquid. It works great!

 

[Holly8991]

My 1st goats milk batch I just went all in...added lye to it and it turned a dark orange color and smelled!!!!
even when unmolding it smelled so bad I thought it was ruined. Turns out the smell goes away and I had a really gorgeous
light ivory color after I added TD to it. I cant wait to try it!

 

[Spice]

It never takes me more than 5-10 minutes to mix my lye into my goat milk.

The ammonium smell is normal and will fade during the cure. The milk may turn yellow or orange but isn't necessarily scorched just heated up a bit. When it scorches it turns brown

Your milk wasn't burned. The ammonia smell is normal when using milk, it will go away with a cure.
Burned milk will turn bright orange or even brownish.

Unusable lye solution should be diluted and poured down a drain, not a toilet.
Take a big bucket, fill with water then add your solution. Slowly pour it down the drain with cold water running.

Your solution is usable though, no reason to throw it out

I freeze the milk in a plastic bag so I can flatten it out. It is easier to break it up and use it frozen. You will still need to put the frozen milk container in an ice water bath and add the lye a little at a time, but 4 hours is way too much time to take to mix lye and milk.

The ammonium smell is normal and will fade during the cure. The milk may turn yellow or orange but isn't necessarily scorched just heated up a bit. When it scorches it turns brown[/QUOTE]

Primrose, Obsidian and Isg, I threw out a perfectly useable 15.4 0z of beautiful, raw GM. I thought it was that I had burnt the milk, and it was the last three tbl sp, after 4 hours of pouring.
Then the very next day, I show a tread regarding the smell, I wasn't sicken by the fact that I could have used the GM, I was actually happy because I thought I did something wrong.
So Last nite I made another batch, same size, but this time it was more slushy, I did all the prep with the ice bath and all. As I was pouring in the lye, I noticed that, because it was more slushy, it was keeping cold, to the point that I started to pour in more because the GM was so cold that the GM was not heating. It took me half the the time, still to much time, but it was my first GM soap. And the lye solution did saponified, when I began to mix in the oils and SB, the ammonia smell start, and as quick as it started, it stop. The soap is in the mold now, and I will cut later. Now that I have been through the steps, I think I am more confident as to what I am doing. I will be making any other batch in a couple of days, and I will add the lye and mix, add and mix, add and mix, I too thought that is was way to much time.

Thank you all for you help,

 

[Spice]

Why were you putting in so little at a time? Curious if you read that somewhere, I've never heard of doing that.

As everyone said, milk soaps stink for a bit...if you've never made soap that's why I highly recommend not doing milk as the first ones so you can get the process down before dealing with other variables.

Lye is a drain cleaner, find a slow drain and clean it! It'll etch the toilet, not recommended. But the solution is fine to use so make another batch instead

Adding lye to GM over the course of 4 hours, I imagine you run the risk of saponifying the milk fats at a higher rate than if you did it over the course of a few minutes. You can add the lye a tbsp at a time, but stir until dissolved before adding the next tbsp. No need to wait minutes for the next addition. If you are starting with frozen milk, or even partially thawed milk, you shouldn't run the risk of burning it. If using cold milk (e.g. just out of the fridge) you'll want to keep it in an ice bath. If using room temp milk (e.g. canned or reconstituted from powder) you'll need the ice bath and to go slowly. I make GM soap from a can about once a year, but I put the milk in the fridge for 24 hours before I use it and put it in an ice bath. (This is fiddly for me and that's why I only do it once a year!)

I like to use the 'split method' when making goat milk soap. Much less fussy for me and the soap comes out a nice off-white, creamy color, just the same as with the more painstaking 'frozen method'. Also- the initial ammonia smell with the 'split-method' is so muted/mild that it's practically non-existent.

For what it's worth, the 'split method' involves dissolving the lye for your batch into an equal amount of water in weight, and then adding the remainder of your batch's liquid amount as fresh (either refrigerated or room temp) goat milk directly into the melted oils either before or just after adding the lye.

Although this will only provide one with a roughly 25% - 30% goat milk soap, you can make a 100% goat milk soap with the spit-method by fortifying your fresh goat milk with enough powdered goat milk to bring the milk concentration up to where it needs to be in order to equal out to a 100% goat milk content, i.e., if you needed 4 oz. of your batch water to dissolve your lye, just add enough powdered GM to your fresh goat milk amount that would normally turn 4 oz of water into fully reconstituted goat milk (then add that into your melted oils).

The reason I prefer using the split-method over the 'frozen milk' method is because I'm one of those that hates dissolving my lye into anything but water. Less troubles and fuss/muss for me that way.


IrishLass

My 1st goats milk batch I just went all in...added lye to it and it turned a dark orange color and smelled!!!!
even when unmolding it smelled so bad I thought it was ruined. Turns out the smell goes away and I had a really gorgeous
light ivory color after I added TD to it. I cant wait to try it!

NsMar, I added little at a time because the person I am learning this from said to keep the GM from overheating and to do that its not adding a bit at a time, let it cool, and add more. I see that as I was making this that it was to much time.

AMD, yes my GM saponified, I hope its still good though.

IrishLass, I will keep the split method in mind, once I get to know just how it all works with different eo and colorants, I can experience more.

Holly, did the smell stay in your house?

 

[Holly8991]

No. it was just a smell contained in the PVC tube. Once I got it out and let it air dry for a few hours it was fabulous!