SMF December Challenge- high and low water batch

[dibbles]

Pictures!! The first is my ghost swirl test batch. The second is a picture of the color morph in the extra batter poured from what will probably be my entry soap. This color change happened in the large mold as well, but wasn't evident until cut.

 

[dibbles]

More pictures! This was my second attempt (patchouli/orange/litsea EO), Clyde Slide pour. I like the soap, but I had equal amounts of orange high and low water, and equal amounts of brown high and low water. I don't know where the the bright orange went! I wasn't sure this would look like enough low water batter was used - the uncolored portion was high water. The first three pictures are vertical cuts, the last is horizontal.

 

[DeeAnna]

I cut the two batches I made yesterday. They both turned out to be more of a "ghost swirl" than anything -- more like Dibbles first picture. Nice soap, interesting "tone on tone" patterns, but nothing overly striking. <sigh>

 

[CaraBou]

Nice looking! It's gonna have halos around the low water from the look of it. I love the effect.

No great halos. I was so psyched when I saw the difference in gelling. That was about an hour after the pour. I pulled it out of the oven / heated water bath shortly afterward so that the low water parts didn't gel too (already learned that the hard way). It must have been too soon to heat up the interface enough to get nice halos. :cry:

This stuff takes forever to cool off!!! I pulled my last attempt out of the oven at 8:00 last night (160 F) and had to wait until 11:00 this morning to release the mold.

Get this: I unmolded and cut that batch within 2.5 hours of pulling out of the oven. It was plenty firm, and it zapped a little but nothing too serious. I was shocked at how quickly it firmed up but both my notes and my timestamped pics confirm it. The loaf cut really cleanly and didn't nick up anywhere from handling too early. I'm at a loss to explain it as I didn't use anything to harden or hasten it (no salt, sodium lactate, high CO, etc). But I'll take a quick cut any day, any way!

My curiosity is not satisfied. I'm still not really understanding it, and am still looking for a more dramatic effect. Way to go newbie, look what you started!

 

[crispysoap]

Thought I'd give this a go and see what happens

 

[Saponista]

I tried an attempt with carrot purée, I did a Clyde slide but I think my batter was a bit too thin and you can't really see any discernible colour differences. Back to the drawing board!

 

[Judiraz]

I posted my entry on the other thread but I wanted to post my other batch. I like the halos in this one and the one bar looks like a flamingo taking flight to me! I did this one in a slab mold. Wish I could learn to cut a slab straight. Every cube was crooked!

 

[snappyllama]

Judiraz, those colors on your submitted bars are swoon-worthy!

ETA: I like the halo on your pastel ones too!

 

[Judiraz]

Thanks, Snappy. I was really happy with my entry colors. All Nurture micas. I used teal, sky blue, shamrock shimmer, and Snow White. The gel really helped the color a lot.

 

[KristaY]

The entries look great so far! I'm really bummed I haven't had time to give this a go yet. So many life and holiday commitments keep getting in my way, lol. I'm going to try to get a batch done this weekend as that's all the time I'll have for it. I'm looking forward to seeing all the entries yet to come!

 

[Saponista]

This is my second attempt I think it looks like alien brains and there is too much colour going on to see the texture difference between high and low water. The low water is the pale pink dropped into a Itp swirl of the other colours. I hope I get a chance to make something I can actually enter! Looking at it closer, I think it didn't gel. I left it wrapped in a towel as I don't have an oven I can put it in and then left it overnight. My soap usually always gels that way, but it is really cold weather at the moment.

 

[DeeAnna]

I think I see what you mean, Saponista, that your soap might not have gelled. The tan on the top half looks to be a fairly consistent shade of tan and the orange (at least on my monitor) on the lower half looks evenly orange.

Do you have a heating pad that you could use for a little extra heat? I got good results by putting my soap in the oven at Auntie Clara's 140 F (60 C) rather than the 170 F I have used in the past. I would think a heating pad on medium or high for an hour or two might do the trick.

Even in my monotone ghost-swirl attempt, I can see slight but definite color and texture differences between the high and low water portions, even though the amount of colorant was constant throughout.

I hope I can get another trial or two done this weekend using this technique!

 

[Saponista]

I just had another attempt and I soaped much hotter this time to try and ensure that my soap would gel. I have kept an eye on it all afternoon and it definitely gelled this time so hopefully I will have something to enter! I think I definitely need to purchase a heat mat though deeanna. I am going to add it to the list of things to look for in the January sales.

 

[crispysoap]

Do you have a hot water cupboard that you could pop the soap into? I find that that does the trick as well.

 

[BlackDog]

Attempt #2 is in the oven! Used BB BlackBerry Sage and it behaved like a dream. Thanks LP for the suggestion. remains to be seen if it will look like anything special! And now I know not to wait too long to cut lol

 

[DeeAnna]

Just put my entry into the official challenge thread, and thought I'd share my other tries here. I didn't get much color variation with these two tries -- kind of a tone-on-tone thing. Even so, I think it's neat how the cut surface of the soap undulates where the soap goes from high water to low and also how the slight color variations draw the eye and look a bit like stone.

The green soap is colored with green chromium oxide and scented with NG Green Tea. I think the two turned out to be a good match. The gray soap was supposed to be a muted lavender-y color (ultramarine violet with a drop of black oxide). I scented this one with NG Blackberry Vanilla and it has a pleasant berry/grape type of aroma. Not sure where the violet went. :mrgreen:

 

[CaraBou]

I was all excited today because I had a design in mind and time to soap. But wouldn't you know, I missed a step! I still have hopes for it, but it took FOREVER to get that vision and then somehow I blew it. It's out of the mold now, cooling down. If I don't like it I might try one more because I have MB'd oils on hand. We'll see how the night goes. We start a road trip tomorrow so it's all or nothing tonight.

I love how fast this low water sets up and can be cut. I'd been down to 12 or so hours before this but now I'm super spoiled and not sure I'll ever go back.

 

[newbie]

I hope it turns out for you! The only big drawback I see to low water is the limitation of FO's that you can use with it.oTherwise, I love how crisp the colors are and the open time and how it gets hard enough to unmold more quickly and how Im more likely to get a smooth surface on my cut that with higher water. If only there were no such thing as accelerating FOs!

 

[DeeAnna]

The two soaps pictured in my post above are a high lard recipe (80% lard, 15% CO, 5% castor), but I was running low on lard for my third attempt, so I subbed some tallow for the lard (62% lard, 18% tallow, 15% CO, 5% castor). I'm new to using tallow, so I'm not yet calibrated to how it soaps differently than lard.

The 80% lard recipe is firm, waxy, and dry at 12-18 hours after molding. It cuts easily like a firm cheddar cheese. The lard-tallow loaf was so hard and brittle it shattered when I tried to cut it -- what a surprise! No, it wasn't lye heavy -- I checked that immediately -- just brittle from the higher stearic acid in the tallow. I heated it up at 170 F for about an hour, replaced my cutter wire, and tried it again. It cut okay when warm. I was expecting poor lather from the extra stearic, but it lathers easily and nicely.

Given this experience, I'm not quite sure a high lye concentration is a good choice for the lard-tallow recipe. I'm curious if a bit more water (lower lye concentration) would help this soap be less brittle and cut a little easier, so I think I'll try it again at my usual 31-33% lye concentration. For the 80% lard recipe, the low water (higher lye concentration) approach works great. I like it too.

 

[CaraBou]

That's interesting D. When did you first try cutting your lard- tallow combo? l wonder how it'd do within a few hours of gelling. I've cut 3 batches now within 4 to 6 hours after pouring in the mold, that's how quick they've hardened. I've used the oven-moderated hot water bath method, which has typically led to gel (at least of the high parts) within a couple hours. After seeing gel, I've let them sit a bit (inside or out of heat) just to make sure I'm not premature, then purposefully cooled them by setting outside for an hour or so. Not a slow cool like I usually do, or like you stated that you did for your entry soap. After that they've still been a little soft and mildly zappy, but plenty firm to unmold and cut without doing damage. That's true even of the batch I had that got wet on the top from sloshing water. I normally don't cut this quick, but it does seem ripe and I must say it is wonderful for curing my insatiable appetite to see what's inside

I'm not saying this is the best method for getting great contrast, but I do get an effect, and what can I say, patience is not my strength.

I was hoping for one more try but I did not pull it off tonight. I like my last two batches but can't help thinking about the potential, including wondering what might have happened if I'd executed the last pour correctly. I'll be gone the next two days, back on Xmas eve for a quiet night with just DH. It is not likely I can pull one off then, but with the short turnaround time described above, I'll never say never til it's too late. I don't have pics yet to enter what I have now; hoping to do that tomorrow before we leave, if I wake early enough.