recipe help!

[MKristen]

I have tried a few batches of soap and they seem pretty drying. I need help coming up with a more moisturizing/conditioning recipe. Here is the last one I tried.

11.25 oz olive oil
3.75 palm oil
3.75 coconut oil
2.5 castor oil
2.5shea butter

8.25 oz liquid (I do 5 oz water and the rest coconut milk)
3.5 lye

How does this look? I truly appreciate any suggestions

 

[sudbubblez]

You could increase superfat to make soap less drying. Your recipe looks really good.

 

[Loolee]

It does look good.

If you want a more mild soap, do you have any softer oils like avocado or apricot kernel oil? If you drop the coconut oil to 2 oz, then add 2 oz of one of these softer oils, you will increase your conditioning properties and decrease your cleansing. I had one person tell me she always tries to get her conditioning over 70. Yours, as written, is at 64, with a cleansing of 11.

Also, I was told that babassu is just as cleansing as coconut oil, but doesn't dry the skin out as coconut does. And I agree. My favorite soap uses babassu and no coconut.

 

[juliet]

How long have you cured your soap for? It gets milder the longer it cures.

I will admit that I fins most soaps dry my skin out a bit. I like to keep my cleansing below 10 and my conditioning on the upper end of the scale. I am completely in love with my 10% coconut, 5% castor, 5% Shea butter, 80% olive recipe that's cured for 3 months. It's lightly bubbly, silky and not drying.

 

[MKristen]

Thanks for all the suggestions. I am using oils that a[*]re readily available nearby, but I do have a soapmaking supply shop about 20 min away so I will see if they have the basseau and avocado oil. I've let them cure about 3 weeks and I tried one batch CPOP with a one week cure, I just started soaping 3 weeks ago so I am so anxious to use my soap!

 

[juliet]

I'm not very good at being patient either and waiting for my soaps to cure! But you will be rewarded if you wait a bit longer. I think that's probably your problem, not your recipe. Even a CPOP soap should cure for 6 weeks. I found my olive oil heavy soap even better after 3 months.

 

[Dorado]

My waiting patience is also very small, so I fill an icecube tray of silicone with soap before I fill the large mold.
There are only 10 grams each, so they dry/cure quickly. =
10 small pieces of testsoap, I can use when patience bursts.
Ok, it's not quite the same as a large piece of soap, but it works for me.

 

[Hazel]

I think your recipe looks good except for the lye amount. Which calculator did you use to figure the lye? I used SoapCalc to check your recipe and I came up with 3.2 oz lye for 5% SF. You have 3.5 oz which would be a lye excess of 4% . Is this a typo or did you actually use 3.5 oz? Because if you did use that much, the soap would have been lye heavy.

 

[MKristen]

Hazel - I forgot to add the 1.25 oz of lard I also used in my recipe, which may increase the lye amount. I used brambleberry soap calc.

 

[Hazel]

Thanks for letting me know. I added in the lard and then checked your recipe on BB's calculator. It listed 3.545 oz lye for a 0% SF and 3.474 oz lye for 2% SF. What did percentage did you add for the SF? Because it looks like you either used 0% or 2% if you rounded the 3.474 amount. I'd recommend at least 5% SF or slightly higher. I generally use 7% or 8% SF.

 

[MKristen]

I did put a 5% superfat, at least I thought that I had. I did the calculations with percentage, I am still trying to figure out how to do it with ounces.

 

[honor435]

maybe try some hp? it gets hard in one wk(dont use full amt of water). Also, with your cp you can use less water.

 

[Hazel]

I did put a 5% superfat, at least I thought that I had. I did the calculations with percentage, I am still trying to figure out how to do it with ounces.

I think BB's calculator is tricky to use because of the way you have to input everything and then make sure you change the SF from the default 0%. It's very easy to forget to change it. Also, I don't like how it takes you to the calculations but if you want to change anything, you have to enter everything all over again. I prefer SoapCalc since it has the SF default set at 5% (I used to forget about it in the beginning) and it opens the calculations in a separate tab. Then I can look at the recipe and easily change it if I want without having to re-enter the amounts/percentages.

 

[RobinHoodFan]

Have you made this bar yet?

That looks like a really conditioning and creamy bar! I've been looking to make something like this .....however is the caster oil % too high that it's going to create a sticky bar? I've heard to keep the caster oil at around 5-6% but yours is at 10%

And what about the INS level? Yours says it's 135 and ideal range is 136-165..is 135 ok then?

is there anything special that needs to be done to use coconut milk or do u just substitue some of teh water for it? Is it as difficult as using dairy milk?

 

[IrishLass]

I just checked your recipe out on SoapCalc and it looks like a perfectly fine recipe, but like Hazel pointed out, it's telling me that your superfat is set rather low (SoapCalc says 1% ). And yes- I included your lard amount of 1.25 oz in case you were wondering. That would make it quite drying indeed, unless you have super-tough, oily skin. Have you checked your soap for zap to make sure it isn't lye heavy? That would be my first concern with a low superfat like that.

however is the caster oil % too high that it's going to create a sticky bar? I've heard to keep the caster oil at around 5-6% but yours is at 10%

I'm not MKristin, but in my estimation the castor amount should be fine. I use 10% in my 50% OO soap and it's not sticky. The 5%-6% 'rule' is not really a written-in-stone kind of rule. I've found that much depends on your recipe and the other oils you use in your formula. I use as hgh as 23% castor in one of my formulas, and 20% in another and they are not sticky at all.

And what about the INS level? Yours says it's 135 and ideal range is 136-165..is 135 ok then?

Some soapers pay attention to INS levels, but I've found them to be such inconsistent indicators that they have become irrelevant to me, and I totally ignore them now when I formulate my recipes. Not the the 'ideal ranges' on SoaCalc are 100% reliable anyway (which they are not, in my experience).


IrishLass

 

[ucmj22]

I'm new myself, but when I put that recipe in to my soap calc on iPhone, it gave me 2.88oz lye when i figured for the lard it gave me 3.03 for lye. My understanding is that if your recipe is lye heavy, it can make for a more crumbly and harsh soap.

 

[MKristen]

Thank you for all the responses! I just read a lot on castor oil and as a newbie I didnt realize that could be too high.

I just did a new recipe taking into consideration some of these tips, I used bb's soapcalc again because I am truly having a hard time figuring out the others.

My new recipe is
11.70 oz olive oil
5.20 coconut oil
3.12 lard
2.60 shea

 

[Hazel]

Looks good to me! I like castor in batches but this looks like it's going to be conditioning enough without it. Please let us know how it turns out.

 

[RobinHoodFan]

Thanks for the tips! That really helps!

 

[MKristen]

Looks like i submitted my reply before I was done. Oops!,

Included in the above recipe is
2.08 oz castor
1.30 palm (was about all I had left)
6 oz h20
2.6 coconut milk added at trace
3.513 lye
Should be a 6% SF