Just made a soap yesterday with Kombo. The smell is WAY too strong for me to use in a body butter (it reminds me of an earthy, slightly rancid, treacle and Marmite) but it is really moisturizing so maybe down the road, I'll experiment with it.
I did Tea Tree and Rosemary e/os in the black part of the soap but used too heavy a ratio of tea tree. My next batch will 1/4 that (or leave it out entirely) and go heavier on the Rosemary. Rosemary e/o with Ho Wood e/o or Copaiba Balsam e/o could be a nice blend also, a little fresh and woody..
The Kombo retains a little of its earthy smell and imparted some color at @ 2% of main oils.
Green portion Lime, Bergamot and Ho Wood e/os, Green Kaolin clay, infusion of Seaweed, Matcha, Alfalfa and Wheatgrass. The seaweed and matcha I use in bath and face masks but here, I'm mainly using the 4 for their deep green color, which will hopefully hold (the alfalfa and wheatgrass were infused in EVOO and used 100% for the olive oil portion, the seaweed and matcha infusions used in my additives)- Smells awesome, fresh and fruity, will make a soap of this again but need to see how the smell lasts as it cures.
White portion, White Kaolin clay, TD, Spearmint, Peppermint e/os, smells strong and clean.
Black portion, Grey Kaolin clay, charcoal, Rosemary, Tea Tree, Himalayan Cedarwood e/os with a 10% sub of Kombo in both my Kokum butter and Palm oil portions.
Soap was made with 1/2 distilled water, 1/2 org. aloe juice from TJ's. It contains water, concentrated aloe and concentrated lemon juice. I reduced the citric acid I added a little, to accommodate for the lemon juice.
Next batch of this will probably just be the black and white. The rosemary and mint would be a good combo, I think. I can't do the strong patchouli scents, since they make me want to throw up, but they could probably go well with the Kombo smell also. My reaction to the Kombo smell is to mask it, since I don't like it!
I usually soap low temps since most of my soaps are Goat Milk but this one was too cold (oil was at 79F and lye was at 81F) since I had to step away from it for a while and I'm not used to LA being chilly, lol, so I have some bubbles in the soap as you can see in the pic. I gelled it in the oven at 135 F for an hour and let it sit overnight in there.
That's probably the one most likely to make me sick. And the Kombo I bought was way worse to me than Neem also! In the butter and GM soap, I use it in, a little goes a LONG way and the smell is masked by a Lavender, Geranium, Him Cedarwood, Tea tree combo.
