Left some oil out of recipe

[pvmtskip]

Just made a 3 pound batch of soap. Used the soap calculator can came up with this: 25% coconut oil, 3% Laurel Fruit Oil, 66% Olive oil, 6% Castor oil, with 13.4 oz. water and 6.7 oz. lye.

My question is I "forgot" to put in the 6% Castor oil. It's been sitting in my closet for 20 hrs. and seems to be setting okay.

Does anyone have an opinion on what will happen to my beautiful soap by shorting my recipe of the 6% Castor oil?

:-(

 

[lsg]

What percent superfat did you use for the recipe? You can zap test the soap when you cut it. If it doesn't zap it is OK. If it zaps, let it set for a couple of weeks and try again.

 

[DeeAnna]

It would be more helpful if you had given weights of ALL ingredients. I'm assuming the 3 pounds was the weight of your oils, not the total weight? If so, I think my math is correct.

Based on 100% pure NaOH, your soap has a slight lye excess, but NaOH is seldom 100% pure. That means there is some hidden superfat built into most recipes due to the NaOH being lower purity than 100%.

Check for zap a couple of days after unmolding. It may be slightly zappy or it may test fine. In either case, give the soap a patient cure and it should be fine.

ETA (edited to add) --

If you held back the castor to add at trace and if you are making this soap with a cold process method, then you will want to know that holding an oil back to be the "superfat" doesn't work in cold process. Saponification is just getting started when your soap is at trace, so the lye will have hours to react with any of the oils it wants to react with.

It won't hurt anything to hold back an oil if it makes you feel better, but there's not any benefit to be had -- and there is a real risk that you will forget to add it! The best way is to mix all your oils together right at the beginning and be done with it.

 

[pvmtskip]

Thanks for the feedback. I had already poured my batch in the soap mold and it was the next day when I realized I had left 6% castor oil out. I decided to not take any chances so took it out of the mold and melted it in a double boiler then added the castor oil. Seems to have done the trick and is now curing in my closet. I will certainly never do that again!

 

[lsg]

Here is a tip for making sure that all the ingredients are added. I use a print out of the recipe and check off each ingredient as it is added.