I want to do a coffee soap but I wasn't sure on the strength of the coffee to use. I assumed to make brew coffee and replace the water amount of the recipe.
Do i follow what the instruction said to make coffee. it said 2 tablespoon (15g) and 250ml of water or should I increase or decrease the coffee amount? I'm gonna boil the water and put in the bowl with the ground coffee and let it sit until it cool down and then filter it and put in the fridge til it get cold.
How much of used ground coffee can I put in at trace for exfoliate purpose? my sample soap batch use 410g of oils/butters
I'm gonna use half of the batter and add a little cocoa powder to get a two tone coffee soap
To reduce the severity of drag marks when cutting, as well as to make the scent last longer - I use only essential oils & infused oils in my soaps, which most people will say don't last very long - there are several things you can do.
1) Grind the coffee again, even if it's ground. Then sift through a fine mesh strainer, like I do with oats that I use in my soap. Throw the larger bits back into the grinder, grind again, sift again, rinse & repeat until you get a very, very FINE texture, almost fluffy feeling. Use whatever doesn't grind down finely enough in your own coffee, or compost it.
2) To reduce color bloom / bleeding which plant materials can cause around each particle, soak that coffee overnight in your essential oils & a bit of castor oiI a la
@Zany_in_CO . This will wet the ground coffee & help to retain scent longer. If you're using fragrance oil, this might not be necessary. I just used very finely ground wild picked nettles & lemon balm mixed with green clay, my essential oils & castor oil in a large batch of soap which I did this with, and it worked beautifully. I let that mix sit overnight FYI.
3) Mix your essential oils ahead of time with the above mentioned in
2, set aside in a sealed jar, at least overnight. Add some vetiver or patchouli essential oil in there to anchor the scent. You can also consider using some clay which has more of a brown tint, or the cocoa powder you intended on using, or a mix of both. The longer you can let this sit, the better. I sometimes will mix up my essential oils a week in advance to retain scent more effectively. The scent blend also morphs beautifully over that time.
4) Oil infuse coffee beans which you have roughly smashed up with a mortar & pestle using one of the oils you will be using in your soap.Around the size of coarse grained salt. Even put some oil in your mortar & pestle while grinding to really get those natural coffee oils releasing into the oil before adding to your entire oil amount. Seal in a jar & let sit at last 6 months - yes, this is planning ahead, and serves many people well. Be sure to weigh that oil out and then add more later once you strain the beans out as the beans will absorb some oil. I learned this from Jo Hausler - forgive me Jo if I am buggering your last name - who is an amazing person to check out in regards to using natural colorants & scents. She has a book, but it's only available as an e-book right now. Worth purchasing. She uses many techniques for layering natural colorants & other plant materials to get vibrant, beautiful colors & scents which last. Her techniques are brilliant & help me to create some amazing soaps.
The assumption has always been that essential oils & plant material based colorants don't last & that there was no way to make them last. If done properly, with intention & taking a few extra, quick steps, they most definitely do, as I know from personal experience, and which other soap makers know. For me, I don't like picking up a soap which blasts me with fragrance which makes me feel sick to my stomach. I want there to be a beautiful aroma which causes people to continue smelling & taking it in, reminding them of the beautiful plants which create these scents. I want the natural colorants I use to do the same. Lurid-looking, fast food colored & scented soaps are not what I enjoy, and many soap buying customers don't either, and these are not what I am producing. Never have, never will, not even if someone requested this & was willing to pay. That said, many people love fragrance oils & not-so-natural colorants. We all do what we feel is best.
It depends on your mindset when making soap, or anything else for that matter. I am willing to take these extra steps, which don't take much prep time at all especially when done in volume, because they give me a superior end product, which is always my goal.
Good luck
One of my favorite soaps is made with triple-strength brewed coffee and coffee grounds. It is amazing for removing odors from your hands. I actually barter with my vet - soap for honey. He told me that it is the only thing he has ever found that removes the animal smell. I made a variant of “coffee and cream“ using 30% goat’s milk and 70% coffee...yummy!
That sounds amazing, will have to try that when I make my first test batch of coffee soap. If it works well for me, I'll be making it in much larger batches as one of the places selling my soap is a bakery / cafe.
