misbehaving bergamot!

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Erg! I LOVE bergamot eo and I have used it successfully since I started 3 years ago. But lately, I'm getting unexpected weird yellow swirls. I've learned that they drastically fade over time, but what the heck?! I don't know if it is just this particular bottle or if bergamot is prone to this? Do you have experience? I'll reach out to Bramble Berry also.
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Oh, boooooo. I'm sorry, Mr. Zing! Bergamot is my goto EO and used exclusively, and HEAVILY, for "Ma's Bars" and I experienced no discoloring (see pic).

It looks like the yellowing is only on the top of the bars, is that right, or did you just not show it going through the bars? Could it be that you had a false trace so the EO floated to the top? Or, perhaps, you were soaping hotter or cooler than normal?

Ma's Bars:
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I use it quite a lot too and haven't seen this happen, although some batches have been quite dark in colour and needed some TD to balance out a bit. But I've never seen it form any kind of pattern - I hate to ask but are you sure you mixed it in very well? I find it doesn't cause any acceleration problems so I generally add it to the oils at the beginning.
 
Why don't you do it like everyone else (@Peachy Clean Soap in particular) and just use Earl Grey tea?

Seriously, ideally you maintain a lot no. list to identify all soap batches scented with that particular batch. Be sure it's really the bergamot EO and not some other ingredient/detail in your process (what do you mean by “lately”?), and then let the vendor know! They should have a keen interest in providing products of consistent quality.
 
Thanks everybody for your input. It is just on top, here are the sides: Latest alternating wall pour

So I thought I mixed it enough. I was going for emulsion/thin trace but had to stickblend just one more time and ended up with medium trace.

@KimW , please tell me more about temperature. I used masterbatched that had sat for a day in a cool, air conditioned basement.
 
I'm favoring perhaps some incomplete mixing as others have stated, but my thoughts and experience on temperature:
Too cool - Can lead to a false trace or somewhat false trace which, as I;m sure you know, leads to separation. What I mean by "somewhat" is when I reach what I think is a light trace, but it's really just barely emulsion. Happens when I soap too cool with harder oils. The soap comes together in the mold, but often the EO ends up floating to the top.
Too hot - When I've gone to the dark side of soaping too hot, I've seen EOs sort of clump together...for lack of a better word...and then the "clumps" end up floating to the top and sort of oozing all over. I've seen a number of posts about that on SMF, btw, though they're usually accompanied by a photo of a soap that's cracked on top. Mine don't always crack when I soap too hot though.

There ya go - my five cents worth. What if you planed or shaved the tops?? :) Or, as my Mr. is so fond of saying, call it a feature. They're just so pretty!
 
People, major case of #CovidBrain this week. This morning, Mrs. Zing found my lost glasses in my front breast pocket. 🤪

So I am realizing it's various EOs with apologies to my beloved bergamot.

I stir and stir and stir so I don't think it's lack of stirring. So now I think I'm soaping at too cool of temperature, and palm, shea butter, coconut solidify? On occasion I will melt oils one day, and then soap the next day. Lots of people soap at room temperature, so @KimW -- or anyone -- how do I avoid false trace? Do I re-heat the oils even tho' lye/liquid is at room temp?
 
Depends on how you define "room temp". The times I've soaped too cool have been in the winter when the house "room temp" is 66F and the basement's room temp is 62F. I don't know if it's the right or best thing, but what I do is heat my oils so that they are at least on the way to looking clear - even if I've mixed them up the day before and they're still fluid. I think @Tara_H solved her problem of soaping too cool by stick blending more and/or walking away and letting the soap do its thing for few minutes before doing another bit of stirring and/or blending. Maybe she'll chime in if she's still up. :)
 
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I'm still up, but barely!

Tbh the thing that helped me the most was 1. Reworking my recipe so that it's sludgy rather than solid at cool room temperature, and 2. Using tallow from the butcher instead of the commercial stuff. (Which helps with point 1.)

I wouldn't consider adding lye unless the oils were warm enough to be totally clear, so if they're coming cooling down enough to starr start thickening it would probably be worth rewarming them a bit.

Edit - corrections, apparently I'm more asleep than I thought!
 
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