OMH Worries - Several of questions

[MirandaH]

Since my peacock swirl came out pretty, despite being a total bomb in the peacock swirl department, I decided to just go ahead and throw caution to the wind and make an Oatmeal, Goat's Milk and Honey soap with the honey we got from the downed tree a couple weeks ago.

I put the recipe through Soapcalc and made sure to measure more than once and be super extra careful with everything. There are a lot of times that I mess up on the liquid oils (usually olive, so I pour that first and remove what I go over) and I have to say that this time, I managed to measure everything as spot on as possible with no decimal points on my scale for grams. I always err on the side of caution (round up on oils and down on lye).

I wasn't sure when to add honey and oatmeal, and had seen many people do it different ways, so I ended up adding both after lightly stirring in the lye. It is in the freezer now, because I am not brave enough to gel anything yet.

This soap took a really long time to trace. Like 45 minutes. Should I be worried? Should I have reduced the water by the amount of honey I was adding? I didn't do that and thought about it after, but only used 3 tbs total for 2lbs oil. Is it abnormal for it to take this long to trace, or is it abnormal and I have just been lucky that the 8 batches I have done prior only took about 5 minutes to reach light trace?

It is going to drive me crazy to not screw with it until it is done because it is wrapped in bubble wrap. How do you know when something is ready to come out of the freezer when it is wrapped in bubble wrap?

ETA: I soaped at room temperature. Both the lye and the oils.

 

[Susie]

Not an expert

I am no soaping expert. However, I just 2 weeks ago made goat's milk soap for the very first time. I did all the steps they told me to to prevent my milk from burning. The lye milk was VERY cold from the milk being frozen and the bowl sitting in an ice water bath. It took forever to reach trace. At least 40 min of stick blending/stirring. Then I put it into the fridge for 24 hours(no room in freezer). It came out beautiful. 24 hours after unmolding and cutting, and the pH was 8.6.

Today I just made some shampoo bars that I let the lye and oils both come to room temperature before combining(something came up that I had to handle outside). It took 34 min to come to trace.

I looked it up in one of my soaping books a couple of hours ago, and lo and behold...it takes HEAT and agitation to get trace. Mystery solved for me.

 

[MirandaH]

I probably should have mentioned that I used powdered GM, but I added the powder with the oatmeal and honey, right after pouring in the lye water and lightly stirring. I haven't found goat's milk here yet that isn't powdered, but I was also worried about burning the milk so I was okay with starting with just the powder.

Hopefully adding the honey and oatmeal gave it enough sugar to heat up, but not so much that it will gel in the freezer.

 

[neeners]

I can't add much insight, but I know many people will ask you to post your soap recipe so they get the whole picture.

 

[MirandaH]

Here it is:

Castor Oil - 5%
Coconut Oil - 20%
Olive Oil - 40%
Palm Oil - 40%
Total oils 907 grams
Water 38% - 344.66 graams
Lye - 123.925 grams Superfat at 7%
Honey - 3 tbs
Oatmeal - 4 tbs
goats milk powder - 1.5 scoops (enough to make 12 oz of goats milk from the water that was added.

Soaped at room temperature. I think that was all there was in it.

 

[MirandaH]

It has been in the freezer for an hour now and while I am sure it is still liquid in the center, it really seems to be firming up now. Kind of hard, from what I can tell, so maybe it will be okay. I would think if it were going to volcano it would be doing it already.

 

[neeners]

looks great to me! this is on my "to soap" list...... so many soaps to make...so little time.......

 

[MirandaH]

looks great to me! this is on my "to soap" list...... so many soaps to make...so little time.......

I have an entire list of things I want to make and a "grocery list" of things I need to pick up in order to do it. Every time I pick up something else I use it because I have no patience and make something else. I figure that as much as I study, might as well do some crash course as well.

 

[Nevada]

Hello Miranda, your percentages add up to 105%
Full water at 38% + Honey = a lot of liquid. This will take a while to harden.
Roy

Here it is:

Castor Oil - 5%
Coconut Oil - 20%
Olive Oil - 40%
Palm Oil - 40%
Total oils 907 grams
Water 38% - 344.66 graams
Lye - 123.925 grams Superfat at 7%
Honey - 3 tbs
Oatmeal - 4 tbs
goats milk powder - 1.5 scoops (enough to make 12 oz of goats milk from the water that was added.

Soaped at room temperature. I think that was all there was in it.

 

[MirandaH]

I'm sorry, I must have read the wrong line on the printout when typing it up. I was trying to do it fast, as if something could be done to fix it now. The Palm should have been 35%, not 40%.

So in the future, I should take the amount of honey I am using out of the water amount? And If so, should I remove it by weight or volume since honey is so much heavier than water? Please forgive typos. I am on my phone and thank you everyone for replying.

 

[seven]

nah you don't need to. you can do full water like you did, or reduce it a lil bit to 35% or even 33%. i think your soap will be okay. i do my additives (oatmeal, honey) at trace. milk with oils if i feel like i'm lacking patience with mixing the milk with lye.

 

[MirandaH]

Still too soft to cut, but so far so good. Practically fell out of the mold.

 

[Lin]

BTW, soap will harden in the freezer because its frozen, not just because its saponified into solid soap. I've pulled soap out of the freezer and it was rock hard, then after sitting on the counter it turned to pudding because it hadn't fully saponified yet.

Also, a lot of people have said they've stuck their soap in the freezer and removed it after 5, 10, 12 hours and then ended up with a partial gel afterwards. So I've always left mine in the freezer for a full 24 hours. Most have been in pringles cans so I couldn't look to see what was going on with the soap at all. Just waited to remove it from the freezer, then left it to thaw, then checked out the top to see if it was ready to unmold.

 

[rsupisces]

Your soap looks beautiful. Can't wait to see it cut.

 

[MirandaH]

BTW, soap will harden in the freezer because its frozen, not just because its saponified into solid soap. I've pulled soap out of the freezer and it was rock hard, then after sitting on the counter it turned to pudding because it hadn't fully saponified yet.

Also, a lot of people have said they've stuck their soap in the freezer and removed it after 5, 10, 12 hours and then ended up with a partial gel afterwards. So I've always left mine in the freezer for a full 24 hours. Most have been in pringles cans so I couldn't look to see what was going on with the soap at all. Just waited to remove it from the freezer, then left it to thaw, then checked out the top to see if it was ready to unmold.

I have noticed this with a couple of batches before. I haven't had the partial gel, but I have had some were the edges started to melt after taking it out. So what I have been doing is leaving it in the freezer until it is totally frozen and then putting it in the fridge for a while and then removing it and letting it sit for a while in the patio where it is cold, but not cold like the fridge, before cutting. In addition to there being a lot of water in this batch, when I took it out of the fridge, I put it on the patio, like I have been doing. Last night, the heater on our patio cut out, so the soap froze again, so now it is sitting in the kitchen defrosting again and I am going to wait until probably tonight to cut it since it didn't get the time out of the cold it normally gets. Normally it is ready to cut after the patio, but I assume the cold slowed things down again. I can't wait to cut it. I would think if I am going to have partial gel, this would be the batch. This is the first one I have done that had any sugars in it. Kinda nervous. I HATE partial gel.

 

[MirandaH]

Seems like it might actually work out after all. Yay!

 

[Saponista]

Love these, they are so beautiful and look like actual honeycombs.