What's your next soap experiment?

[CaraCara]

Are you going to leave the soap unscented except for the Turkish coffee? I've never smelled that kind. I made a coffee/cocoa soap that I left unscented. It does have a faint scent from the coffee grounds that I mixed in. But it was just regular coffee and the scent is FAINT (like stick your nose on the bar )

For this one I'll leave it unscented. The coffee is perfumed (just opened the bag and it's still there, although not as potent as I remember) and I've got some of it infusing in olive oil right now for tomorrow morning. I'm looking forward to this one.

 

[sunfloweracres]

Making Chocolate soap darker

I am likely not going to be able to make much soap for the rest of the weekend. I did have a couple of experiments this past week though. I made my first OMH soap using GM, and then made "chocolate milk" using cocoa powder and GM (and chocolate FO). I wish I had gotten a bit darker on the chocolate milk soap with the cocoa, but overall, they came out fairly well.

Sounds great! Adding a little cold strong brewed coffee along with cocoa powder gives a nice rich Brown and does not seem to alter the fragrance, especially with Chocolate FO. (The first pic is the second batch of cp soap I ever made. The second pic has Chocolate FO and Fresh Brewed Coffee FO plus instant coffee for exfoliation and removing odors)

 

[jenneelk]

Speaking of coffee and chocolate.. I was thinking about doing a 'Mocha' bar with a coffee/chocoate FO that I have here and strong brewed coffee with milk for my water. Any thoughts on how it might work? Tea is used I know so figure brewed coffee would be ok? I have trouble pulling scents through at .5 opp so hoping the fresh coffee might work.

As for next up.. Castile and I'm dreading it!

 

[sunfloweracres]

Mocha Soap

Speaking of coffee and chocolate.. I was thinking about doing a 'Mocha' bar with a coffee/chocoate FO that I have here and strong brewed coffee with milk for my water. Any thoughts on how it might work? Tea is used I know so figure brewed coffee would be ok? I have trouble pulling scents through at .5 opp so hoping the fresh coffee might work.

As for next up.. Castile and I'm dreading it!

It will work just fine with cold strong coffee and cocoa powder. I used the special dark cocoa powder from Walmart. Have not used milk yet.
Have fun with Castile. :razz:

 

[jenneelk]

Thanks! So u used cocoa for color and no other brown oxide or pigment?

 

[karenbeth]

I think it's time to try goat milk . And I've had a request from a vegan for black soap. Maybe I'll use some oat milk for that. Any other ideas?

 

[Bicycle808]

Pepper? Let me know how that goes Bicycle. My FIL is a HUGE pepper fan and loves my soap. If I made him pepper soap, well, he'd be freaking ecstatic. My MIL is easier. She loves lavender. Lol.

No pics or anything, but the pepper bars came out pretty nicely. I made it by adding some ground black pepper with OO/PO/CO/castor oil at 5%SF, slight h2o discount, and i replaced the h2o with cold assam black tea. It looks cool; the tea didn't darken the soap as much as it has in my other recipes, and the result looks kinda like choc chip ice cream. You can almost smell the pepper, but not too much. The guy who requested it thinks it's awesome; other ppl liked it too. I think it's neat.

In a related story, I made some red tea/red pepper soap with the same basic recipe as above, but i used rooibos instead of assam and xxxtra hot chili powder instead of black pepper. I was worried abou the acid content of the chili powder, but the soap came out pretty nice, albeit weird looking and kind of a burnt sienna color. Sadly, my wife reports that it is not safe to use, um, everywhere. :wtf: So, i'll probably use it as hand soap til it's all gone. :crazy:

 

[jenneelk]

Karenbeth what about coconut milk? I've done coconut milk powder to
Make the milk but will try the liquid next.

 

[karenbeth]

Funny Bicycle808.
Yes jenneelk that could be good and I have some in the cupboard. This guy is allergic to so much so the oats might soothe his skin a bit. Maybe I'll make two varieties. So sad to have to do so much work :wink:.

 

[jenneelk]

True.. but if it works for him.. he will likely tell others. :mrgreen:

 

[karenbeth]

Jenneelk I was joking about the work. I'm on holidays and loving making soap instead of cleaning my house. The more soap the better!

 

[LadyM]

My next experiment is carrot soap!

 

[kazmi]

That's funny Bicycle808. But I'm sure it is beautiful hand soap!

My experiment is to make salt bars that come out like they should. First batch made this past weekend didn't turn out pretty. But I love how they feel so I'm on a mission

Then I'm on to GM soap. Now that I feel a little more comfortable with the process of adding lye to my frozen liquid (tea, aloe vera) I'm ready to try GM. Unfortunately my only access to GM is from Wholefoods but it's better than nothing. I have it in the freezer for when I'm ready.

 

[sunfloweracres]

Thanks! So u used cocoa for color and no other brown oxide or pigment?

Yes, only cold strong brewed coffee instead of water, 1 t. ground instant coffee, and 1 T. Special Dark Cocoa at trace to 32 oz. oils. To the other batch, just cold strong brewed coffee, and at trace added 2 T. ground coffee grounds for color and exfoliating. I love it!

 

[jenneelk]

Thanks Sunflower.. can't wait to try it.
Kazmi - I'm a newbie and did 100% GM last week.. turned out to be very easy, much more than I thought. I actually had trouble getting my temp to go up so had to let it sit out to warm. LOL I used frozen GM in small cubes and did 1/4 at time with 1/4 lye and also had my pyrex glass (IMO glass gets coldest) in a ice water bath. Simple simple.. took about 5-7 min. of stirring and all the lye was mixed in. Mixed oils at 70 and 76 for lye.. poured to containers at 76 degrees.
With the pyrex I also liked that I could be reassured of it all melted by letting the lye solution sit and then look under the glass to see for sediment lye. GL.. I LOVE mine already and know it will be a fav.

 

[Skatergirl46]

I'm going to do a beer soap next. I've had my beer open and it's now good and flat. Tomorrow is probably going to be the day! Not sure of what fragrance to use in this one.

 

[jenneelk]

I see beer mentioned a lot.. what are the benefits to using it? I know beer in hair is used... And good for making mamas milk (beer or brewers yeast).. but haven't heard of beer soap until here.

 

[Candybee]

I made salt bars and can't keep my hands off my tester bar. It hasn't even cured yet but I can't help myself.

I also started using coconut almond milk instead of coconut milk. I'm liking it so far. It tastes better too-- the milk that is not the soap. LOL

 

[Candybee]

My next experiment is carrot soap!

Oooh! I want to try this too! Good luck with your carrot soap.

 

[MooreThanBags]

I was looking at the soap trimmings I had leftover after preparing my soap for sale and thought how much the trimmings look like toasted coconut. I am thinking about making my goat milk soap with coconut FO and crumble the darker trimmings on top to resemble toasted coconut. Weird idea?