White spots on soap

[Charmaine S]

Hi everyone. Can anyone help me with figuring out if the white spots on my soap are air bubbles or something else? Iv always been making HP (with no problem) and just recently I tried to do CP but the spots are bothering me. It destroys the look of my soap :-(

 

[BattleGnome]

Those look like steric spots. Steric spots happen when the steric acid has a chance to cool down before the other fatty acids. Soaping hotter or encouraging gel can help in future batches

 

[Charmaine S]

Those look like steric spots. Steric spots happen when the steric acid has a chance to cool down before the other fatty acids. Soaping hotter or encouraging gel can help in future

Thanks for your reply. The white soap is with milk. Im afraid when I mix lye/milk to my hotter oils, it will scorch and turn brown :-(
Anyway, i will try it and see if it will be different from my other soaps.

 

[BattleGnome]

You can experiment with the split method for the milk. Mix your lye with and equal amount of water and add the remainder of the liquid portion at trace (aka the milk). This should allow you to mess with your temps a bit before you need to worry about the milk.

Note: I don’t make milk soaps myself but there are a bunch of threads about it. Hopefully someone who makes milk soaps will be on in the morning with more advice

 

[penelopejane]

They look like stearic spots to me too. I would do exactly as Battlegnome says. Doing the split method means you don’t have to worry about burning the milk and making your soap brown.

Soap at above 43*C (110*C) and wrap your soap when you’ve finished to keep the spots at bay.