Goats milk soap made my skin dry

[JustLovely]

I am a new soapmaker, only a few months and i am making goats milk soap.

My first batch dine two months ago were made with pure, fresh and raw milk using 100% coconut oil in 20% superfat. My water(milk)-lye ratio is 2:1. I add sodium lactate, only 1 tsp per 1kg oils. This batch of sosp is perfect and creamy. My sk8n fells soft and moisturized even at first use.

Now i made my second batch using the same recipe only with sour goat's milk this time coz i forgot to leave the freezer turned on when we went out of town for three days. I still add some sodium lactate but in less amount, like 1 tsp per 2kg. The problem is i notice my skin getting drier and my face has this slight tingling sensation after use. Th3 soap sample i use ftom this batch is only cured for a week. And i learned that its safe to use by then only its not as hard as when the soap is fully cured.


Anyway, do you have any idea why this batch feels dry? Thank you. I appreciate your insights.

 

[Misschief]

First off, a week is too soon. It might be safe but it won't be at its best. I don't even think about trying any of my soaps until they've had a minimum of four weeks cure time, some even longer. Try your sample again in about a month; I think you'll notice a big difference.

 

[JustLovely]

First off, a week is too soon. It might be safe but it won't be at its best. I don't even think about trying any of my soaps until they've had a minimum of four weeks cure time, some even longer. Try your sample again in about a month; I think you'll notice a big difference.

Wow, thank you for taking the time to respond. That's probably why. Its my first time to use sour milk so i wanted to try as soon as i can to see if the sour milk made any difference, especially now that i started selling my soaps. I dont want my customers To think i didnt have the same quality as before. But thank you for reminding me that patience is the key with CP soaps, the longer it cures, the better it gets. Thank you so much

 

[Misschief]

Wait... how long have you been making soap?? If you're selling after only a few months after starting to make soap, you're getting ahead of yourself. I've been making soap for almost four years and have only just started selling at a local market.

 

[shunt2011]

I agree with Misschief, you have no idea how your soap will perform in the long run. You need to take time to make and test. I made soap for 2 years before even thinking of selling. Do you know if your formula will develop DOS in 6 mos. Many can’t use high CO soap. Also with 100% CO you don’t need SL. Its already a rock solid soap though will dissolve quickly.

 

[JustLovely]

Wait... how long have you been making soap?? If you're selling after only a few months after starting to make soap, you're getting ahead of yourself. I've been making soap for almost four years and have only just started selling at a local market.

I started making soaps early this year. I only sell to friends and neighbors as of right now and an online store, but not like in the mainstream market because in my country, we need FDA license in order to do so. I dont even have a website yet. I make only a few batches and i dont do complicated recipes. Only pure goats milk soap, unscented.

 

[Terri E]

Wow, thank you for taking the time to respond. That's probably why. Its my first time to use sour milk so i wanted to try as soon as i can to see if the sour milk made any difference, especially now that i started selling my soaps. I dont want my customers To think i didnt have the same quality as before. But thank you for reminding me that patience is the key with CP soaps, the longer it cures, the better it gets. Thank you so much

I agree with the others. I have been making soap for about 8 years now and sold my soap after 2-3 years of testing and formulating. I regularly use kefir which is fermented milk in my soap and have noticed no difference in the quality or function of the soap from using fresh or powdered goats milk. 100% coconut oil soap even with a 20% SF is more cleansing and drying than any other soap I make. It is a good soap but for those with oily skin, not dry.

 

[JustLovely]

I just thought using 100% goats milk as water replacement will help the cleansing (drying) power of 100% CO soap. The first batch went great, only this batch was drying on my skin. But as already mentioned, maybe its not yet fully cured.

I understand your point that soapmaking should not be just a business, its an art, its passion. I believe the same. Though i am a new soapmaker, i have always loved handmade soaps. I made them for myself and my family but my friends whom i gave gifts to, asked to buy some and recommended me to others. Its not like i already sold thousands. I make few batches and i havent even sold a hundred bars yet. And im not yet confident to try out swirls and new recipes. I use single cavity molds and sticked to pure unscented soaps. If you dont think i am qualified to sell my soaps, i honestly respect your views.

 

[shunt2011]

Just make sure you have all your business licenses and insurance in place. Once you sell, you have a business. Your going to do what you want to do you’ve got your mind made up. Are you ready, no

You don’t even have an understanding of what different things bring to a soap. Research is just as important and making the product. Then testing.

 

[Obsidian]

Goats milk or any milk really, doesn't add much to soap beside a possible increase in lather and a silkier feeling lather. Its not going to help moisturize or otherwise improve your skin.

100% coconut oil soap really needs a good cure. Personally I would cure them at least 4 months. Curing is more then the soap just getting harder, it undergoes more chemical changes and becomes milder. When testing young soap, limit it to hands and learn to do a zap test.

I'd recommend trying a more balanced recipe, one that will be nicely cured in 4-5 weeks. My personal favorite and the one that family is always asking for is:

lard 50% (you can use palm oil if you prefer but lard is better)
olive oil 25%
coconut oil 20%
castor 5%

Use 5%-8% superfat. I like 5%

 

[JustLovely]

Shunt2011: I actually have a business licence from the local government and the Internal Revenue. I didnt want to get into trouble later without it. I only lack fda licence to operate since its not easy to obtain here. The qualifications are for big companies with at least 1000 monthly moq. And making soaps in the kitchen using kitchen tools (used for soapmaking only) probably wouldnt qualify. Its not like in the US where you dont need fda for soaps if its not claiming anything but soap. Expert soapmakers in my country said i wont need fda licence yet unless i make the monthly moq, but i should still comply with the guidelines. And their organization is trying to help microenterprises by voicing out concerns to help us. And i do research, i read, i write to bramble berry and other bloggers to ask questions and i join soapmakers groups and forums. They are usually very helpful. I asked to join here because i learn so much from the posts i have read from here. When i couldnt find the answers on the internet, i ask the experts. I know i dont know much, i never claimed to be. But i know the importance of learning continually. And i try to keep myself to do only what is not complicated. Its an easy recipe that i have tried myself. I know soapmaking is not easy though it seem easy, because it deals with the skin. Thats why i make sure i test my soaps. I just want to understand what happened to this batch, and if somebody here say it cant be used, then id probably rebatch it for personal use or for laundry.

Obsidian: I could not find any palm oil here, only palm olein which is easily found at the grocery store. Olive oil is quite expensive and im not sure about lard in the market, i tried to render my own but i didnt use it yet. Thank you for the recipe, id try that if i can. Dont worry, i wont try to sell soap using this recipe (if anybody is concerned). In my country, we try to limit ingredients because your way of costing your products cant be applied here. Our retail price here is your wholesale price there. And i dont charge for my labor cost to make the soap affordable. Im not trying to make my soaps cheap, but im trying to make a good soap out of limited resources. It not really for making money. But id like people to appreciate the beauty of handmade soaps.

To everyone: Please know that im not here to cause problems or arguments, i am here to learn from your experiences and to ask for insights. Im not in anyway a competition or trying to be a disgrace in the world of soapmaking. I am trying my best here to do good in what i chose to do.

 

[Misschief]

To everyone: Please know that im not here to cause problems or arguments, i am here to learn from your experiences and to ask for insights. Im not in anyway a competition or trying to be a disgrace in the world of soapmaking. I am trying my best here to do good in what i chose to do.

This is one of the best places to learn that I have found... anywhere! Welcome... and I do mean that. (Incidentally, introduce yourself in the Intro Forum; we'd love to get to know you.) Also understand that most of us here have been learning, perfecting our recipes, and at times, expressing our concern when we feel someone might not be truly ready to be selling. I, too, shared a lot of soap with friends but it was to get their input, their assessment of my recipes. I didn't start selling any of my soap until I had at least a couple of years of soap making under my belt, until I knew how my recipes would hold up over time. We're not trying to jump down your throat; we just want you to know what you're doing, and why. Please, don't take it as being nasty; that isn't the intention at all.

 

[SaltedFig]

Shunt2011: I actually have a business licence from the local government and the Internal Revenue. I didnt want to get into trouble later without it. I only lack fda licence to operate since its not easy to obtain here. The qualifications are for big companies with at least 1000 monthly moq. And making soaps in the kitchen using kitchen tools (used for soapmaking only) probably wouldnt qualify. Its not like in the US where you dont need fda for soaps if its not claiming anything but soap. Expert soapmakers in my country said i wont need fda licence yet unless i make the monthly moq, but i should still comply with the guidelines. And their organization is trying to help microenterprises by voicing out concerns to help us. And i do research, i read, i write to bramble berry and other bloggers to ask questions and i join soapmakers groups and forums. They are usually very helpful. I asked to join here because i learn so much from the posts i have read from here. When i couldnt find the answers on the internet, i ask the experts. I know i dont know much, i never claimed to be. But i know the importance of learning continually. And i try to keep myself to do only what is not complicated. Its an easy recipe that i have tried myself. I know soapmaking is not easy though it seem easy, because it deals with the skin. Thats why i make sure i test my soaps. I just want to understand what happened to this batch, and if somebody here say it cant be used, then id probably rebatch it for personal use or for laundry.

Obsidian: I could not find any palm oil here, only palm olein which is easily found at the grocery store. Olive oil is quite expensive and im not sure about lard in the market, i tried to render my own but i didnt use it yet. Thank you for the recipe, id try that if i can. Dont worry, i wont try to sell soap using this recipe (if anybody is concerned). In my country, we try to limit ingredients because your way of costing your products cant be applied here. Our retail price here is your wholesale price there. And i dont charge for my labor cost to make the soap affordable. Im not trying to make my soaps cheap, but im trying to make a good soap out of limited resources. It not really for making money. But id like people to appreciate the beauty of handmade soaps.

To everyone: Please know that im not here to cause problems or arguments, i am here to learn from your experiences and to ask for insights. Im not in anyway a competition or trying to be a disgrace in the world of soapmaking. I am trying my best here to do good in what i chose to do.

Your regulations seem difficult for a small maker, from what you have written & the advice you received is interesting (that you might not be big enough to need any more licenses than you already have).

Do you have a way of checking on the advice local expert soapers have given you, to find out from your government if you need FDA licensing? It would be nice, for your piece of mind, if this were true.

Anyway, your original question seems to have been answered (dry because the soap is young and made of coconut), so I would just add one small thing. You said that you used the same recipe, but added sour (fermented?) goats milk instead of fresh, and reduced the amount of sodium lactate you added (please correct me if I have got this wrong). If I have this correct, then your second soap should end up slightly milder, after it's cured, than your first one (because the superfat will be slightly higher - the lactic acid in the sour milk will react with some of the sodium hydroxide, effectively increasing the superfat).

Palm olein is palm oil with the hard fats removed (to make the oil better for use in deep fryers), so you won't have the stearic acid based part of the oil, which is sold separately as palm sterein. This will cause the oil to act a lot more like olive oil (the olein in the name gives this away - what you have is mostly the oleic acid based part of the oil).

 

[MySoapyHeart]

Hi and hello there, JustLovely, welcome

Here is a link to a helpfull thread with some insights regarding selling soaps. I have read it severel times myself, and perhaps it could be usefull to you too.

You may also find that this thread will help you understand why people here react when you say you sell your soaps to friends, family and also via an online shop, when you are just a newbie.

https://www.soapmakingforum.com/threads/are-you-ready-to-sell-your-soap.16002/

Great to have you here! And ps. We love pictures

 

[Obsidian]

Sorry, I didn't even check to see what country you are in.

What oils are available to you? While there is nothing wrong with all coconut, it won't be a long lasting soap as it melts away quickly. Maybe we can help formulate a different recipe that will perform better.

I'm ok with people using my recipe however they want, that includes selling. I've shared it all over the net, its not a secret recipe or anything.

 

[Saponificarian]

I have the same recipe as Obsidian that uses Palmolein instead of palm oil and it is great! The Palm Olein adds hardness without the waxyness you get from palm oil at that usage rate.

50% Palm Olein
20% Ccoconut oil
25/30 Rapeseed oil/Olive oil/Sunflower oil
5% Castor (Sometimes I use Castor sometimes I don’t)

Makes a great soap though. Mild and ready in 4 weeks.

 

[cmzaha]

For me I could never use a 100% CO soap and hate super high superfat, which is also very hard on my plumbing, with the exception of a salt bar. You really have not made enough soap to even know a good versus bad soap. The recipe Saponificarian posted above would be a very nice soap, although I cannot use 20% CO, it is a very good recipe

 

[JustLovely]

Thank you everyone.

Misschief: Im not trying to take things personally, i understand everyone's point and respect that, but to be honest i was shocked with how people reacted. Culture shock might be the term i should use. Its my first time in a forum of foreign experts. Lol. I know i am not fully ready, thats why i keep learning, and experts' advises are important. Thats why i dont try more recipes even when i want to. I like zum bar very much thats why i made goats milk soap. I still dont know how they keep their scents last so i stick with unscented soap.

SaltedFig: i didnt say i dont need fda licence anymore, i just said not yet. And the soapmakers oranization here are voicing out these type of concerns to fda to help microenterprises comply with the law.

Yes i reduced the amount of sodium lactate to 1tsp per 2kg oils. I know SL may not be necessary for 100% CO, i just added a few because of the moiturizing properties.

MySoapyHeart: Thank you, ill check the link today

Obsidian: Philippines. Most oils are available here, but most are imported so its quite pricey. Coconut oil is the cheapest and easiest to find coz it is produced locally. How about 100% lard, would it be better than coconut? Combining oils is quite pricey for a $1 goats milk soap here. I leave the best recipe to the established artisan soapmakers until im fully ready and can get my price higher.

Saponification: Wow, i know you use palm olein. I have read about your 50% PO and 50% shea soap recipe. Palm olein is readily available anytime but shea butter is around $20/kg here... I have a kg of shea butter but the soap will cost more thsn my goats milk so i didnt try that yet. I didnt know palm olein can still make a hard bar even without the palm sterein. But i know i cant use it 100%. Thank you for the recipe. I will definitely try this.

Cmzaha: i know. Even with using soap calc, i wouldnt know how to mix oils yet. I know hard oils and soft oils, but not ready to use them for right formulation.

Again, Thank you everyone.

 

[SaltedFig]

Ah. Anymore ... I meant that you already have licenses, and the fda license would be another one. My comment was meant to indicate you had my sympathy with the number of licenses you need, and a hope for you that you don't have to get any more than what you have

And the second soap should be milder because of the increased superfat, once it cures.

Good luck.

 

[JustLovely]

SaltedFig: hi, i didnt mean anything with my text. But yeah, i dont know why it was hard here for fda. Fda license may not be necessary for small enterprises. But if ever i get a client who would be interested to resell, usually they look for fda licence. So its quite complicated. But since i still dont need a reseller, i dont bother. i cannot make several batches coz im also a full time employee...