Honey transformation in soap

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Baqn

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Hallo guys! One topic is bothering me since I started adding honey to soap. What is happening to honey when we put it into the soap. Soap is everything else but not a gentle media for honey. I found many sources that say fructose and glucose are degraded in strong alkaline media (which is the soap, from the moment you add the honey till the moment you use it). I don't know if you have tried the taste of honey soap but it is not sweet. Still nobody can say which are the products of the reaction between fructose or glucose and sodium hydroxide. What scientists have found is not what you want to put on your skin (we make natural cosmetics, right?) - furfuryl alcohol, furanons, hydroxyacetone, hydroxybutanone, cyclopentanediones, cyclohexanedione, butyrolactone, hexanedione, carboxylic acids and so on and so on. The list is endless.
I doubt something remains from the honey in its initial form.
 
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"...What scientists have found is not what you want to put on your skin (we make natural cosmetics, right?) ... [long list of chemical names], carboxylic acids and so on and so on...."

It seems like a lot of people's definition of "natural" is "something with a reassuring, plain language name that I can find in a box in my pantry."

Let me pick on carboxylic acid, one of the chemicals in your "I don't want it on my skin" list. You've just eliminated acetic acid in vinegar, citric acid in citrus juices, and amino acids found in protein. Oh, and all of the fatty acids we so lovingly include in our soap.

Think about it.
 
"...What scientists have found is not what you want to put on your skin (we make natural cosmetics, right?) ... [long list of chemical names], carboxylic acids and so on and so on...."

It seems like a lot of people's definition of "natural" is "something with a reassuring, plain language name that I can find in a box in my pantry."

Let me pick on carboxylic acid, one of the chemicals in your "I don't want it on my skin" list. You've just eliminated acetic acid in vinegar, citric acid in citrus juices, and amino acids found in protein. Oh, and all of the fatty acids we so lovingly include in our soap.

Think about it.

I know what carboxylic acid is. I know most of them are not harmful to people but they are not monosaccharides, right. And I knew someone would pick precisely carboxylic acids from the list.
Would you disagree that fructose and glucose undergo transformation in strong alkaline media?
 
Yes, simple sugars chemically react with alkalis. No question there.

If you'd made that statement, I'd be okay with what you wrote. But you kept going with the "we don't want that on our skin, do we?" kind of comment.

Stick with chemistry facts and you're fine. The artificial distinctions between what's "natural" and what's "not natural" are what I have a problem with.
 
https://books.google.bg/books?id=NDnNCOG6RWcC&lpg=PP1&hl=bg&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false - starting from page 290

https://books.google.bg/books?id=xteiARU46SQC&lpg=PR1&hl=bg&pg=PR1#v=onepage&q=alkaline&f=false - at page 266

In an Organic chemistry book it is written:
In presence of strong alkali solution, especially when heated, solutions of monosaccharides become dark yellow to brown colored. If conditions are more energetic they sediment as brown resins. It is estimated that product of this reaction are compounds with less carbon atoms. If precise ratio is presented there is opportunity to produce racemic lactic acid (yield - 53%) , methylglyoxal and so on.
 

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Oils and fats also react with lye and are changed.:D

Fats react with lye but the hydrocarbon chain remain intact. It is not the same. You don't get new compounds with different molecule. Also reaction between fats and lye is very well known and without multiple compounds. You know that from oleic acid you get sodium oleate and so on. You don't disrupt the molecule of oleic acid into two or three parts.

Yes, simple sugars chemically react with alkalis. No question there.

If you'd made that statement, I'd be okay with what you wrote. But you kept going with the "we don't want that on our skin, do we?" kind of comment.

Stick with chemistry facts and you're fine. The artificial distinctions between what's "natural" and what's "not natural" are what I have a problem with.

Yes, my mistake. Sorry for my comment. It wasn't intentional.
 
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@Kcryss It's not about the temperature only. The greatest problem in lye based soaps is the alkalinity. Ingredients should be stable in strong alkaline solution. I do mostly CP soap and the severity of the initial mixture is extreme. In HP soap making it is the same but degradation process is slower. There are recipes with honey, milk and beer. It is claimed that soaps have particular properties due to the additives we used to know they posses out of the soap. Do we know what is happening to them in the soap? Do we have milk, honey and beer in the soap or we have other substances? As you can see there are no sugars remain after you put them in the soap. Then why people who teach soaping say sugars in soap do that, sugars in soap do this ... I am feeling lied
 
@Kcryss It's not about the temperature only. The greatest problem in lye based soaps is the alkalinity. Ingredients should be stable in strong alkaline solution. I do mostly CP soap and the severity of the initial mixture is extreme. In HP soap making it is the same but degradation process is slower. There are recipes with honey, milk and beer. It is claimed that soaps have particular properties due to the additives we used to know they posses out of the soap. Do we know what is happening to them in the soap? Do we have milk, honey and beer in the soap or we have other substances? As you can see there are no sugars remain after you put them in the soap. Then why people who teach soaping say sugars in soap do that, sugars in soap do this ... I am feeling lied

Agreed, there is more than temp to consider. I also agree that what we put in the soap can and often is transformed by the time we have a final product. However, as many on this forum have said many times, this is a wash off product and very little is left behind after rinsing.
I also think most consumers do not care to understand the science of soap ... or most things in general really. For example, I fix peoples computers these days. I try to teach a lot of the people I work with what I'm doing and why, but for the most part, they really don't care. They just want it to work.

A lot of what you see/hear on the internet about soaping is wrong. They are not lying to be malicious, they truly believe what they are saying is correct. Maybe the best way for you to combat the misinformation is to create your own youtube channel and teach the science along with soap making. :)
 
Doesn't a lot of this go out the window with hot process and adding honey etc. after the lye and oils have been saponified?
I use honey mixed with distilled water and warmed up to add after saponification in HP. I have also mixed it with apple cider for HP. Truthfully I haven't noticed much difference between using honey, sugar, or maple syrup in HP.
 
I do mostly CP soap and the severity of the initial mixture is extreme.

What do you mean by "severity"?

It is claimed that soaps have particular properties due to the additives we used to know they posses out of the soap. Do we know what is happening to them in the soap? Do we have milk, honey and beer in the soap or we have other substances? As you can see there are no sugars remain after you put them in the soap. Then why people who teach soaping say sugars in soap do that, sugars in soap do this ... I am feeling lied

But are you being lied to? Let's take Olive Oil, a major ingredient in a lot of artisan soaps. Olive Oil IS moisturizing. Olive Oil DOES contain large amounts of antioxidants. Olive Oil DOES have strong anti-inflammatory and antibacterial properties. All of this is true and factual. The question is, once the olive oil has been combined with lye and sopanifies and becomes 'soap'...do those properties still remain?

The answer is...as far as Olive Oil is concerned...mostly. I do know that artisan soap is naturally antibacterial...it's been proven time and time again that washing with good old soap and water prevents the spread of germs. That soaps made with a higher percentage of soft oils are more moisturizing than soaps made with a higher percentage of hard oils. And that a true Castile Soap is very gentle.

Now let's take Honey. Honey is naturally antibacterial, it's full of antioxidants, it's extremely moisturizing and soothing, and it helps to unclog pores. All of this is true and factual, but as with Olive Oil, what happens to all those properties once it's used in soap? IMHO...nothing remains...it's just label appeal. Why? First of all, we can only use a small amount of honey without running the risk of frying our soap because of its high sugar content. Second, we only get those benefits when we put the honey on our skin and leave there for xx amount of time.

But I am not a scientist and I have never had my soap chemically analyzed so again...my opinion.
 
@Baqn Those papers are too advanced/difficult for me to read right now, but I do have a few thoughts to share. When you started mentioning sugars being broken down into smaller compounds, I immediately started thinking about microbial consortia in soils, marine sediments, sourdough starter and any food created through fermentation. Some of the microbial processes involve the breakdown of sugars into smaller compounds, acids, etc. Then I decided to look up one of the compounds in your list. I picked it because I could remember how to spell it, hydroxybutanone, and here’s what I found:

Acetoin, also known as 3-hydroxybutanone or acetyl methyl carbinol, is an organic compound with the formula CH3CH(OH)C(O)CH3... Acetoin is a neutral, four-carbon molecule used as an external energy store by a number of fermentive bacteria. It is produced by the decarboxylation of alpha-acetolactate, a common precursor in the biosynthesis of branched-chain amino acids. Owing to its neutral nature, production and excretion of acetoin during exponential growth prevents overacidification of the cytoplasm and the surrounding medium that would result from accumulation of acidic metabolic products, such as acetic acid and citric acid... Acetoin, along with diacetyl, is one of the compounds giving butter its characteristic flavor. Because of this, manufacturers of partially hydrogenated oils typically add artificial butter flavor - acetoin and diacetyl - (along with beta carotene for the yellow color) to the final product, which would otherwise be tasteless.[5] Acetoin is used as a food flavoring (in baked goods) and as a fragrance. It can be found in apples, butter, yogurt, asparagus, blackcurrants, blackberries, wheat, broccoli, brussels sprouts, cantaloupes and maple syrup.

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acetoin

My guess is that all, or virtually all, sugar breakdown products that are produced in soap are also found somewhere in the natural world.
 
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@TheGecko , under severity I mean harshness. Strong alkaline media like 50-40 even 20 % lye solution is very disrupting media for many compounds.
Yes soaps have antibacterial properties because the molecule is not changed. Also process of saponification is well investigated. Same is with coconut oil - good antibacterial properties. I can't disagree. I don't think oils and butter are the best example in this case since we make soap from oils.

I don''t cry I am lied for something else but adding honey and other sugars to soap and claiming that the soap have properties due to the additives. I suggest better investigation before adding something to a soap. As it is made with Essential oils, Fragrance oils and colorants. Sorbitol and Erythritol are stable under alkaline conditions and have same properties to fructose and glucose. Why don't we use that ingredients?

@Mobjack Bay I agree some of the listed compounds are found in the nature but they are not sugars. You don't know what to expect from so many compounds. I am sure many natural compounds are even unknown to science. Maybe many compounds product of honey degradation are harmless to people but they are not honey. Now you know what is happening with honey and you can investigate the brief list of compounds. Also you know that not sugars in honey are responsible for the properties of the soap with honey. I wanted to share that information and see what will be the people's opinion. I know we all love honey and can't resist using it in soaps.
 
@Mobjack Bay I agree some of the listed compounds are found in the nature but they are not sugars. You don't know what to expect from so many compounds. I am sure many natural compounds are even unknown to science. Maybe many compounds product of honey degradation are harmless to people but they are not honey. Now you know what is happening with honey and you can investigate the brief list of compounds. Also you know that not sugars in honey are responsible for the properties of the soap with honey. I wanted to share that information and see what will be the people's opinion. I know we all love honey and can't resist using it in soaps.

To keep things in perspective, there will be diverse sugar breakdown products in yogurt, kimchi, kombucha, sourdough bread, and probably our intestines as well. We can also add meat and bread crust to the list, particularly the nice browned crispy parts where sugars and proteins form poorly characterized compounds via the Maillard reaction.
 
Can I ask why sugars in soap increase bubbles. If they are undergoing a reaction with the lye what new compound is responsible for the increased bubbly lather.

It has been 40 years since I took chemistry.

Sorry but I am not sure. Following the logic that hydoxyl groups are responsible for the action of sugars I suppose that smaller compounds with hydroxyl groups are supporting bubbles too. Lactic acid/sodium lactate is compound with hydroxyl group too. It is one of the products of the degradation.
 

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