Thick cream

DeLaureen · Apr 7, 2011

Hi

I am pretty new in lotion making.
I would like to make very moizturising and rich shea butter cream. I came up with this recipe:
60% water
20% shea butter
8% olive oil
3% cetryl alcohol
7% emulsyfing wax NF

The cream came out good and very moizturising but the problem is that it is too thick- its very bad to put it to jars- the top of cream do not stay smooth- if you get what I mean

Can I reduce amount of emusyfing wax in this recipe?
The other question is that is the Emulfysing wax NF the same thing that Ewax?

Genny · Apr 7, 2011

What are you putting in there at 2%? Because that only comes up to 98%.
Emulsifying Wax NF is a type of E Wax (emulsifying wax).
There are other kinds of E Wax also.

I believe that Emulsifying Wax NF is usually used at 3% for lotions. Your supplier should have info on how much to use.

Edited to add that I just came back and saw that you're making a cream, not a lotion. So with that, I'd have to ask where you bought your e wax.

DeLaureen · Apr 8, 2011

Hi, Genny

Thank you for answer.

I forgot to write that recipe includes 1% preservative and 1% essential oil.
I order my Ewax from gracefruit.com. For cream they reccomend to use it 5-7 %.

Genny · Apr 8, 2011

All the emulsifying wax NF I've used has already contained Cetearyl Alcohol, so I usually use stearic acid as the additional thickener. I don't know if that would change anything though.

Also, I have no idea if this has anything to do with it, but for lotions and creams I've usually only seen the preservative and EO or FO measured out for the entire 100%, so you'd base the percentage of your preservative and EO on 100% of the ingredients. Which means really your formula would come out to more than 100% once you add the preservative.

You could also up the water and decrease the butter a bit to make it less thick.
Unfortunately with bath and body recipes, what works for one person may not work for another. Everything seems to make a difference, the humidity, how you're stirring, the temperature of where you're making it, etc.
That's why people experiment and experiment, just make sure you're taking really good notes of everything you did with each batch.

DeLaureen · Apr 8, 2011

Thanks, Genny

I will reduce ewax to 5% and see what happens then

Earthchild · Apr 10, 2011

E-wax is used at 20%-25% of your oil phase. You have a 31% oil phase, so your e-wax amount seems just right for a very thick cream. I would start by reducing the shea butter and increasing the olive oil. Shea at 20% is going to make a VERY thick cream! Maybe start at 10% shea and go up from there. You can keep the oil phase the same and just reduce butter and add oil, then if you still find it too thick I would go towards increasing the water, decreasing your oil phase, and reducing your emulsifier. HTH!