Yesterday was interesting for soap making.
To begin, I had all of my oils, colors, and lye ready, and the lye was almost to the temperature of 105 degrees. I have one of my molds ready, and another 2 in a package that I received from ebay today. So while waiting I planned to put together the other molds, so I open the box and find that the shipper did not send the hardware (wingnuts and bolts to hold the collapsible wood together) along like he did my first mold. So I had to take my lye out of the ice bath and run to the hardware store and get hardware.
When I got back my boyfriend was kind enough to assemble my molds while I mix the oils and lye, which were thankfully at the right temperature. So I start using the stick blender, and to my surprise, it pulses once and dies. So I throw it in the trash and start hand mixing. I put into the batter my Bramble Berry Blackberry cybilla fragrance, which I think smells exactly like grape soda - my plan was to use various shades of purple and a white to represent the fizzy soda. The FO immediately turns the batter yellow, hence making my purples (which have worked in other batches perfectly) into various shades of green, and my white was yellow. So much for grape soda". I continued on, with the idea that it could just be called "grapevine" instead. It stayed the consistency of water for 5 hours before it became jello/pudding consistency, and it finally heated up 15 hours later. Even with towels around it, I don't think it ever reached gel stage. This recipe has not given any problems before, so what a weird batch of soap! I have a feeling that it will just look like camouflage rather than grape-anything. I blame my dead stickblender and this FO.
Has anyone else had these problems, especially with "Blackberry Cybilla" (but not exclusively)?
To begin, I had all of my oils, colors, and lye ready, and the lye was almost to the temperature of 105 degrees. I have one of my molds ready, and another 2 in a package that I received from ebay today. So while waiting I planned to put together the other molds, so I open the box and find that the shipper did not send the hardware (wingnuts and bolts to hold the collapsible wood together) along like he did my first mold. So I had to take my lye out of the ice bath and run to the hardware store and get hardware.
When I got back my boyfriend was kind enough to assemble my molds while I mix the oils and lye, which were thankfully at the right temperature. So I start using the stick blender, and to my surprise, it pulses once and dies. So I throw it in the trash and start hand mixing. I put into the batter my Bramble Berry Blackberry cybilla fragrance, which I think smells exactly like grape soda - my plan was to use various shades of purple and a white to represent the fizzy soda. The FO immediately turns the batter yellow, hence making my purples (which have worked in other batches perfectly) into various shades of green, and my white was yellow. So much for grape soda". I continued on, with the idea that it could just be called "grapevine" instead. It stayed the consistency of water for 5 hours before it became jello/pudding consistency, and it finally heated up 15 hours later. Even with towels around it, I don't think it ever reached gel stage. This recipe has not given any problems before, so what a weird batch of soap! I have a feeling that it will just look like camouflage rather than grape-anything. I blame my dead stickblender and this FO.
Has anyone else had these problems, especially with "Blackberry Cybilla" (but not exclusively)?
