Can you help me understand this recipe?

[MzMolly65]

This is the first recipe I formulated on my own without following someone else's recipe. I have very dry, cough*mature*cough skin so geared toward that and as well I wanted a simple, uncomplicated base recipe that I could add various colours or scents to.

20% CO
45% OO
20% RBO
15% MB (sometimes I use SB or CB, the numbers don't change much, and yes I still run it all through soap calc)

ETA: water at 38%, SF 8%

Hardness 36
Cleansing 14
Conditioning 60
Bubbly 14
Creamy 22
Iodine 69
INS 134

I liked the first sample scraps I played with. It felt like it was meeting my skin's needs but I'm finding that bars I made Jan 13th are still a bit soft to the touch and also feel waxy or oily. I thought they would be harder by now. I would like them to be drier and harder without compromising on the goal of simple soap for dry, mature skin.

.. maybe I'm just impatient and they will harden with more cure time.

Any thoughts or suggestions?

 

[dixiedragon]

If it was made on Jan 13, it's not even 3 weeks old! Soap changes a LOT in the first six weeks. My standard soap recipe is very "meh" at 3 weeks - no bubbles, etc. But at 6 weeks it's great, and it keeps getting better.

With that high OO percentage, your soap will remain soft for longer, but it will eventually get hard.

However, nothing wrong with trying a new recipe now! In six weeks, you can compare it to your first recipe.

 

[cmzaha]

Your soap probably should cure out a few months like you would a castile soap. RBO is very similiar in properties as OO so in my mind you basically have 65% OO soap which would require a longer cure. For mature skin I try to keep the lauric and myristic numbers low. I have one recipe that lauric is 6 and myristic 3 with a condition of 61, cleansing 9 in soap calc. Makes a very mild gentle soap using palm shortening, lard, coconut, palm, castor and sunflower.

 

[kikajess]

Have you considered adding sodium lactate? Since I started using it, my bars feel firmer sooner. The loafs come out of the molds much better and the bars slice like a dream. I use 3% ppo, added in my lye water.

 

[MzMolly65]

Have you considered adding sodium lactate? Since I started using it, my bars feel firmer sooner. The loafs come out of the molds much better and the bars slice like a dream. I use 3% ppo, added in my lye water.

I wondered about that .. but I think I'll have patience and see how long they take to cure. I'm ok with the idea that they might take a while to harden as long as they will hardened some day, LOL!

If they take ages to harden I might try the SL.

 

[kazmi]

MzMolly congrats on your first own recipe!!!! I have *cough* mature skin and find that even a lower amount of MB (5-10%) is good. Softens my skin without the waxy feeling. The high OO and RBO is nice too but you'll need to wait it out the full 5-6 weeks to judge if you're going to fall in love with your soap. I know it's so hard to wait but it's best not to judge the results of your soap until it's fully cured. I used to test out slivers of my soap each week but now I don't bother because I know it's not going to tell me anything.

Have you tried avocado oil or castor oil in your recipes? I love avocado for my skin (5%) and castor (~5%) gives the soap a nice luxurious feeling. Also, for my 'winter' skin I make every soap with CB. It adds to the hardness of the bar and keeps the winter flakes away.

 

[MzMolly65]

Have you tried avocado oil or castor oil in your recipes? I love avocado for my skin (5%) and castor (~5%) gives the soap a nice luxurious feeling. Also, for my 'winter' skin I make every soap with CB. It adds to the hardness of the bar and keeps the winter flakes away.

I have tried castor oil but not avocado. I chose oils I can find locally AND affordably. I've always used oat milk in my bath water for winter skin and love the results so I tried making this soap using oat milk as my liquid. It's cheap and easy to make. I LOVE the way the test scraps feel, I was just worried the bars might not harden but after reading everyone's comments I think they will, given some time.

 

[CaraBou]

Adding water at 38% of the weight of your oils is considered "full" water. You can reduce that to promote a harder bar sooner. If you are not messing with colors or swirls that require extra time to work with, and you are not using ingredients that greatly speed trace (like many floral FOs), and you are not using the HP method (which dries out when cooking) you might try reducing your water. To really see the effect of water reduction, you could replicate your recent recipe using less water (try 33%) -- minus swirls and accelerating FOs -- and see what a difference it makes. Soapcalc.com and other calculators let you change the water input; it's up to you to figure out what makes sense for your recipe. Over time you'll be able to intelligently estimate a reasonable water reduction for each individual recipe. Or you can always ask here!

 

[MzMolly65]

Adding water at 38% of the weight of your oils is considered "full" water. You can reduce that to promote a harder bar sooner.

Thank you for this advice, much appreciated. I'll definitely try a batch with reduced water.