How much Rosemary Oil Extract
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You should check with who you bought it from, in case there are different types of ROE. For the ROE that they sell, Soap Making Resource says:
"To incorporate ROE into your batch, simply mix in .02% - .08% rosemary oleoresin to your melted soap making oils before adding your lye when making soap."
"To incorporate ROE into your batch, simply mix in .02% - .08% rosemary oleoresin to your melted soap making oils before adding your lye when making soap."
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The best to do with the ROE is to add the max usage per your supplier to your jug of fresh oil. I add ROE to all totes of oil when I first open them. If adding to your soap, again per usage rate for your ROE do not add in Sodium Citrate for chelating, it apparently does not work well per testing done by Kevin Dunn. This is why I use BHT, since I add sodium citrate to all soap
Good to know. Thanks for this. I guess my ROE will sit on my shelf for a while; I've got 5 lbs of citric acid and about 1 pound of sodium citrate to use up. What is BHT?
It's a synthetic antioxidant. In the the only experiments we know of involving soap, it seems to synergize well with sodium citrate as a chelator. In fact that's the most effective stabilizer combo we know of.
ROE is an effective natural antioxidant but combining it with sodium citrate seems to be a little counterproductive. It works well with tetrasodium EDTA as a chelator, but worse with SC than by itself.
BHT plus EDTA also works well.
So, if it works well with sodium citrate, then am I safe to assume that it will work well with citric acid? Because citric acid and sodium hydroxide make sodium citrate. Right? What benefit, if any, will I see if I add BHT to my batches? So far, I'm not seeing any DOS in my old stuff except for one batch that has a couple of spots (which I need to check on). The last time I checked it, they were still small and the soap didn't smell bad (yet). That soap was made with either flax or sesame. (Lesson learned regarding keeping notes!!) However, both of those oils are off of my soaping list.
Yep it's the same whether you use sodium citrate or make it by reacting citric acid with NaOH. You don't strictly have to use stabilizers, especially if you don't tend to sell or give away a lot of soap. But still, the world is a dangerous place and the stabilizers will make it very unlikely for your soap to get spots or discolor over time. Otherwise all it takes is a tiny bit of metal contamination or whatever, and oxidation is a chain reaction (which is why it sometimes appears as spots -- it starts in one place and spreads). You also may not know when you give soap to someone how long it will take them to use it or how they'll store it. In my view, stabilizers enhance the quality of the product.
Adding BHT and sodium citrate or EDTA has stopped my issues with dos in my high lard soaps. I used to use ROE, before I started using sodium citrate and it really never stopped the dos issue. I know my lard has BHT added but it is apparently not quite enough to completely deter dos. I add in BHT at the rate of .01% and it does the trick
What kind of lard are you using? I'm using lard that's a year old (or nearly). But there's no rancid smell at all. And I've cooked with it. No funk there, either. (I bought a 50 pound block from Soaper's Choice not realizing how much lard 50 pounds actually was.) I threw the box away a few weeks ago because I only have 17 pounds left and was able to put it into smaller containers. Now that I think about it, I'm almost positive it had "BHT as preservative" written on the box. I'm going to have to re-check all of my old soaps tomorrow to see if any of them have developed dos (and measure the dos spots on the two that have it).
You might want to research side effects before using BHT and put it on your label too if used.
The amount you need as an antioxidant in soap has zero side effects. You can buy it from makingcosmetics.com.
I thought BHT was a cancer concern?
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