Recent content by Stacie

So...first attempt: the recipe was a Chinese one (my friend knows enough Chinese to translate). It's for a shampoo bar, which is what her dad was looking for. It's a pretty basic OO, CO, and lard soap with 7% superfat. We used molasses. We added molasses and fragrance after a light trace...

Ha! I'll enable awesome projects anytime! We found a couple recipes...one brown sugar and oatmeal one and one black sugar shampoo bar. We're going to do both with the black sugar. Undecided on the scents at the moment. Maybe tobacco and bay leaf in the shampoo bar. Scheduled in a couple weeks...

Well, I s'pose I'll just pick a soap recipe I've had success with, add black sugar and report back. Wish me luck!

I don't have a picture. She did say it is not scrubby at all. I found some black sugar charcoal soap here http://www.wishtrend.com/skin-care/1162-gentle-blacksugar-charcoal-soap-klairs.html. That site claims the black sugar is for pore cleansing (fwiw). That's the only mention of black sugar...

A friend of mine from Singapore said her dad uses black sugar soap made by some old man that has decided he's too old to make it anymore. She'd like to have me make some for her to give him as a surprise. She says their black sugar is like our dark brown sugar but even more sticky and strong...

Thanks!

How much water do you normally need to add to dissolve the soap? Enough to cover? More? Less?

Not only do I not understand how to calculate the lye in this circumstance, but I don't understand why the concern about FO/EO since it would likely have been added in the initial failed batch. If so, does that change anything for the rebatch?

How would you figure out the lye amount in this case, not knowing how much oil still needs saponifying?

I love you for posting this! The pictures were so incredibly helpful. Easy peasy.

Calculate soap for mold

I've been very happy with the HEC so far. I may try xanthan gum again at some point since it seems so similar to the HEC. I could try it again with the method that worked for the HEC and see if that transfers.

I had no idea anyone was against borax. I use it in my clothing detergent, per a thread on this forum where that seemed to be pretty standard. I've experienced no skin irritation, nor has my my family, since using it. And the liquid soap with HEC worked well with no irritation to any user. Of...

Regarding cooking down the soap to thickien, that's what I was trying before I started this thread. I did that countless times before I finally gave up. There appears to be no happy place where it is not running and not starting to solidify. I had used the instructions from the Everything...

Grating before it's cured...brilliant. Thanks!