PLEASE tell me EVERYTHING about GM soap :D:D

[motherhues]

I am being a tester for an acne bar (ahem... had three children, hit my thirties...seems like hormones came raging back or something...anyhow, its embarrassing so moving along...) and it's made with goatsmilk and its the nicest soap I ahve ever used.

Now, I love my soap, I have been soaping for 12 years... have gone through several incarnations of recipes and have a good basic recipe I enjoy making. but this goats milk soap is amazing!

Do I suck at soapmaking? or does goats milk really make a superior bar? LOL...

I have made a few batches of soap where I just add powdered milk and honey and oatmeal at trace as an additive for friends who request it but I have never sold milk soap because of the whole dark soap/light soap/gell/no gel arguments and i dont want to have to worry about it

but now I think perhaps I need to try

thanks for indulging me!

 

[Soapmaker Man]

Well call me extremely biased, but, YES, goat milk makes a good recipe better and a great recipe, simply, awesome! My farm fresh goat milk, along with my aloe vera juice and silk makes a fantastic bar. You know, when I started this soapmaking adventure right at 2 years ago exactly this month, I started using canned GM, and never ventured off that path! I love my GM soap, and a lot of people have verified they love it too. I do like adding lard and tallow in my recipe, but make the same recipe subbing those AF's for palm oil. GM soap lowers the PH of the soap closer to our skins PH. If you make 2 recipes exactly the same, the same day, same conditions, 6 weeks later the recipe using GM will have a lower PH. I have my own method of incorporating Gm into my batter. I've developed it over the past year and do not need to freeze the GM or anything like that. I also encourage my GM soaps to gel. After full gel, I do remove my wood top from my wood TOG Mold, and cool under a fan in front of a AC duct. But love that gel!
If you have any questions, please feel free to ask me and I'll try to help all I can. I do "Paul's GM RTCP Soap Process." LOL Nice off white bars most of the time depending on what fo's I'm using. I sometimes add a touch of TD to my batter.

Paul.... :wink:
A GM RTCP Soapier
TOG Soapmaking Tools!

 

[motherhues]

could you share a basic way to add the goats milk? a friend of mine said that in the past she added it at trace, about a 1/2 a cup, will this make a good recipe good-er But I have never tried that... Or do I need to replace all of the water with GM Ice for a great recipe?

I just don't know where to begin... though I imagine using canned milk would be a good thing for soap, because doesn't the canning process involve heat, like soap, so the goat milk should be ok through the gelling process?

My basic soap is just olive, coconut, shea and cocoa butters. nothing fancy, just good, basic soap with yummy essential oils

thanks so much!!

 

[Mothi]

I am still new on making GM soap, so by far not as knowledged as Paul.

Experiment #1: I used slightly frozen water for the lye solution. I planned to add GM to the oil mixture, but I forgot and ended up adding it near light trace instead. Only part of this soap did gel. This soap turned up a light orange compared to my other soaps, but I don't know if that was also due to the fact I was using a different brand olive oil than the other tries.

Experiment #2: I used slightly frozen aloe juice instead of water for the lye solution. I added GM powder to the GM to consider this 100% GM soap. I added GM at light trace. I did let this one gel. Color ended up being a beige/light brown sort of color.

Experiment #3: I uses slightly frozen aloe juice again for the lye solution, but this time I mixed when both solution and oil were about 100-105F (previous ones had been around 110-115). I didn't use GM powder this time and only added GM at light trace. This soap came out the lightest of the three. A beige with a hit of yellow not orange.

Overall, I liked using aloe juice for the lye solution because I don't have to be worried about burning the goat's milk. I like it partially frozen so the lye solution ends up about 110F at most, although I might prefer it get about 100F only. (Still not sure how much temperature at various stages affect the overall end product.) I like adding the GM at light trace. Next times I will use GM powder again. I will also experiment with lighter colored olive oil to see if that will lessen the color of the soap. When my soap was gelling, the temperature seemed to hit 135F. It gelled within the first hour. Once I saw it had gelled all the way through, I removed the covering and let it cool. (I was using a plastic container instead of a wooden mold since I don't have one yet so I had to use towels to insulate it.) So I am still left wondering how to go about letting gelled GM soap cool when in a wooden mold. My assumption is not to remove it until 24 hours later when it is formed. Keep in mind that I am new to this whole CP GM making stuff. I only have 3 batches which are now 2 weeks old. But my interest in soap making is primarily CP GM soaps.

 

[Soapmaker Man]

Thank you Mothi for sharing those test results with us! 8)
I really like using the aloe vera juice as the medium to mix up my 50% lye solution with. I add my silk fibers when I make a new 1/2 gallon batch. Adding my very cold GM to my batter at emulsification has really worked well for me. That coupled with the fact that everything is at room temperature, makes this method I use so very easy. I have started adding a little more powdered goat milk powder to my farm fresh goat milk to replace the aloe vera juice so I can honestly say the liquids that make up my recipe are 100% goat milk. This would be the same as using 100% goat milk, and adding aloe vera powder to your goat milk, I'm just doing it in reverse!
Thanks again for the great report! Every time we share, we all learn.

Paul.... :wink:
A GM RTCP Soapier!
TOG Soapmaking Tools!

 

[motherhues]

thank you all so much on the grocery shopping list for the week olive oil, goats milk, aloe juice

LOL...

I am very excited to try!

oh, one last question, then, its best to blend everything at room temp, then, and cool with fan, after gel, to keep it from overheating?

Does this mean no CPOP? and definitely no cheating, I have to wait 4 weeks to use?

I think my mom will love this! She has the softest skin of anyone I have ever known. And having goatsmilk will make it even nicer

 

[Soapmaker Man]

thank you all so much on the grocery shopping list for the week olive oil, goats milk, aloe juice

LOL...

I am very excited to try!

oh, one last question, then, its best to blend everything at room temp, then, and cool with fan, after gel, to keep it from overheating?

Does this mean no CPOP? and definitely no cheating, I have to wait 4 weeks to use?

I think my mom will love this! She has the softest skin of anyone I have ever known. And having goatsmilk will make it even nicer

I do everything at room temp. After I melt my hard oils, and add my soft oils to make up a batch. I make up 10 batches worth at a time (masterbatching) and love it!
Now you didn't read it here but;
I can use my GM soaps within a few days after pouring! It only gets better with a longer cure!
Now back to your normally scheduled programming!

Paul.... :wink:

 

[motherhues]

Paul, you naughty thing.

I always used my regular CP soap after 2 weeks in my home, I never sold it that way (been sopaing for 12 years, selling for 8) but always at home... I have no patience.

Now that I learned all about CPOP wheeee.

and really, CPOP is just forcing gel. so, in theory, any soap that gels should be ready "right away"



I can't wait til payday... or until someone buys 10 bars of soap... c'mon, anyone??? anyone???

Thank you all so much!

 

[Sanghama]

So Paul, when you say that you add extra powdered GM so that ALL the liquid is GM, do you mean that technically if you added powdered Goats milk to ordinary aloe vera juice it would be called Goats milk?

Forgive me, I'm new. And I presume that RTCP is room temperature cold process? I've not heard that one before, although your description of it sounds intriging.

 

[Soapmaker Man]

No. I use GM milk along with my aloe vera juice that I make my lye solution with. I add dried GM powder to my regular GM toincreaser the strength, or make a stronger GM milk. Basically, most of the aloe vera juice is water, so it would be like making new GM milk pou of the powder, or with the aloe vera part of the total liquids. I can then say, I have a 100% gm soap. I could use water to mix my lye in, and then add my powdered GM, or I could just add 100X dried alow powder, the way I do it, it just seems easier.....

Paul

 

[mare61]

Now why would you say your soaps are 100 % GM. Don't you use any oils to make your soap???????? I always figured if something was 100 % it wouldn't include anything else. I'm still new at this so I need to know..... Thanks

 

[Soapmaker Man]

Now why would you say your soaps are 100 % GM. Don't you use any oils to make your soap???????? I always figured if something was 100 % it wouldn't include anything else. I'm still new at this so I need to know..... Thanks

100% GM as for the liquids, silly. You cannot make soap with 100% GM only, as most of the GM will not saponify, only the fats in it. Since the aloe vera juice is mostly water, I can add the powdered GM and say my soaps are made with 100% GM as the liquids and aloe vera as an additive along with silk. My recipes have between 7 and 9 oils, butters, in my 4 best recipes.

 

[mare61]

Thanks for clarifying that for me, I promise I won't ask silly questions again! LOL