questions about colloidal oatmeal

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kaelily

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I've used regular oatmeal before...ground it to a powder and it was still scratchy for me. I was wondering if anyone uses colloidal oatmeal in their soap...how do you like it and where do you get it? I'm thinking of the Aveeno packets, unless there's something else. :)
 
I've gotten it from here:

http://www.saratogascents.com/colloidal_oatmeal.html

And I love it. Very smooth and almost imperceptable texture in the finished soap.

It colors the soap a light brownish color. I put it in half the soap batch and swirl it for a light contrast.

All the benefits of oatmeal with no scratchy-ness.

I've not used Aveeno's so I'm no help there with comparisons.

HTH
 
GardenGirl said:
I've gotten it from here:

http://www.saratogascents.com/colloidal_oatmeal.html

And I love it. Very smooth and almost imperceptable texture in the finished soap.

It colors the soap a light brownish color. I put it in half the soap batch and swirl it for a light contrast.

All the benefits of oatmeal with no scratchy-ness.

I've not used Aveeno's so I'm no help there with comparisons.

HTH

DO NOT BUY FROM SARATOGA SCENTS!!!! i don't know if they're officially out of business yet, but they took my money and never shipped my order, and paypal finally paid me back. Colloidal oatmeal was one of the items i ordered that they never sent.

Colloidal oatmeal is apparently just oatmeal that has been ground very fine. Couldn't it just be ground in a coffee grinder? Does it need to be rolled instead of ground? Cheaper and easier than ordering, for sure :)
 
Ooo - I love scratchies! Seriously - but to each his own, right? Anyhow, I have put oatmeal in my food processor and while I haven't been soaping long enough to tell you what the result is in a finished soap (mine are still curing), I can tell you that using a food processor worked very well. Some of the oatmeal got to a flour-like state. I mean it was extremely fine. I would think that would be fine enough, but I can't say for sure. Good luck!
 
I grind mine really fine in a blender, then I sift with a flower sifter. Anything that is not fine enough goes back into the blender for more grinding. It comes out pretty fine this way.
 
I grind the oats down to a medium grind, and also to very fine. Start off with food grade oats.
 
I think (correct me if I'm wrong) that colloidal oatmeal is the whole oat, ground into floury powder, so it's entirely different from ground up porridge oats. There has to be some reason to explain the huge price difference over here. :wink: Anyway, my CO soap is not scratchy like porridge oat soap.
 
From my understanding, colloidal oatmeal is super fine, absobs water, but doesn't sink. If used in a bath, colloidal oatmeal will make it milky.
 
soapbuddy said:
Try adding a jar of baby oatmeal to your batch. I dislike scratchy things in my soap too.

I hate the scratchies, too, and I second the baby oatmeal. That's what I use, only mine is not the jar kind, although I'll definitely keep that in mind. I buy the dry boxed kind that comes in fine flaked form- Earth's Best Organic Wholegrain Oatmeal Cereal for babies. I get it at my local healthfood store. Ingredients: Organic whole oat flour, organic rolled oats, Vitamin E, Alpha amylase (enzyme), electrolytic iron. I use 1 tbsp. ppo for my OMH soap, and no scatchies.

IrishLass :)
 
IrishLass said:
soapbuddy said:
Try adding a jar of baby oatmeal to your batch. I dislike scratchy things in my soap too.

I hate the scratchies, too, and I second the baby oatmeal. That's what I use, only mine is not the jar kind, although I'll definitely keep that in mind. I buy the dry boxed kind that comes in fine flaked form- Earth's Best Organic Wholegrain Oatmeal Cereal for babies. I get it at my local healthfood store. Ingredients: Organic whole oat flour, organic rolled oats, Vitamin E, Alpha amylase (enzyme), electrolytic iron. I use 1 tbsp. ppo for my OMH soap, and no scatchies.

IrishLass :)

Sounds good. :wink:
 
thank you all for the tips! I seriously thought I was missing something...everything I was finding from google searches said to grind up oatmeal (which is what I did)...but now after reading the responses, I did a couple of things wrong: I used the wrong kind of oats (used instant) and I didn't grind them up long enough. Once I got a powder, I stopped....I should have kept grinding them to a much finer powder/flour. I'm going to give this another go...I want to use it for soothing itchy/rashy skin.

thanks so much!!
 
I use baby oatmeal too. Its great! I add it to my oils and it melts right away!
 
Just buy oat flour at the grocery store. If you can't find it (Bob's Red Mill is one brand that's widely available), grind your oatmeal in a coffee grinder and sift, sift, sift. Regrind the scratchy bits and sift some more. You'll end up with oat flour. Collodial oatmeal isn't a special kind of oats. It's just super fine. Dottie
 
Coloidal is just super fine, with grains that won't clump back together again. I buy Aveno if on sale at WalMart, or else their house brand.
 
just an update: This might not be new, but I noticed today at walmart there's another brand of colloidal oatmeal...it's over by the Aveeno stuff. It's called Dr. Teal's Oatmeal bath soak and the ingredients just say "colloidal oatmeal"...it's a 1.5 lb. bag ($4.47) and the front of the bag is see-through...looks like a light tan flour. I bought some to try in soap..will see how I like it. :)
 

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