Weird Color Question

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KudzuGoddess

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I seek the guidance of my revered soapy elders! How do I make a soap intentionally colored the same color as fragrance oil discoloration but without the fragrance oil? Will coffee in the lye solution do the trick? Beer? Tea? What if I soaked a vanilla bean in the oils and then strained out the bits? When I use micas, clays, or cocoa powder it comes out too opaque, I am looking for something brown with a hint of translucency when it gets a good gel and if possible it wants to be natural. Is this a soap that only exists in my mind? Love to you all and thanks!
 
I seek the guidance of my revered soapy elders! How do I make a soap intentionally colored the same color as fragrance oil discoloration but without the fragrance oil? Will coffee in the lye solution do the trick? Beer? Tea? What if I soaked a vanilla bean in the oils and then strained out the bits? When I use micas, clays, or cocoa powder it comes out too opaque, I am looking for something brown with a hint of translucency when it gets a good gel and if possible it wants to be natural. Is this a soap that only exists in my mind? Love to you all and thanks!
Others will chime in as far as other additives, but… Neem oil turns soap a natural earth tone light brown, but it has a STRONG scent of its very own. Cocoa does color batter but it needs to be dispersed well to avoid specks. I’d also like to know if a beer like say Guinness would change the soap?
 
I seek the guidance of my revered soapy elders! How do I make a soap intentionally colored the same color as fragrance oil discoloration but without the fragrance oil? Will coffee in the lye solution do the trick? Beer? Tea? What if I soaked a vanilla bean in the oils and then strained out the bits? When I use micas, clays, or cocoa powder it comes out too opaque, I am looking for something brown with a hint of translucency when it gets a good gel and if possible it wants to be natural. Is this a soap that only exists in my mind? Love to you all and thanks!

Mica would be your best best, along with gelling your soap.
 
I love using Green Tea powder in soap for a warm brown with speckles or some aloe power for a nice tan color. D48D3943-7473-496E-859B-1A17F2BC3F2A.jpeg75B7E8A9-609E-4584-9A30-9C34C9AF8B60.jpeg
The top one was an attempt at green tea Ombré and the second I used both green tea powder(brown) and aloe powder (tan). The white is kaolin clay.
 
I have a lifetime supply of carob powder to use up first.
First-world problems! 😆 Could be worse, really. Hot chocolate made with half-half cocoa:carob powder is amazing!

But back to soapy realms, carob syrup/molasses might indeed be another viable addition to soap. Guess it's appropriate to ask my fridge if it can spare some for non-food purposes.


ETA: Why has nobody in this thread mentioned honey (+ heat/gel/CPOP) yet? Everyone under the sun is complaining about OMH discolouring.
 
First-world problems! 😆 Could be worse, really. Hot chocolate made with half-half cocoa:carob powder is amazing!

But back to soapy realms, carob syrup/molasses might indeed be another viable addition to soap. Guess it's appropriate to ask my fridge if it can spare some for non-food purposes.


ETA: Why has nobody in this thread mentioned honey (+ heat/gel/CPOP) yet? Everyone under the sun is complaining about OMH discolouring.
My honey soap was definitely tan coloured but also smelled a bit scorched
 
Others will chime in as far as other additives, but… Neem oil turns soap a natural earth tone light brown, but it has a STRONG scent of its very own. Cocoa does color batter but it needs to be dispersed well to avoid specks. I’d also like to know if a beer like say Guinness would change the soap?
I made a soap with stout once and the section with no colorant came out a light brown. Coffee grounds also do that in my coffee soap, but then you also have brown specks.
 
All, thank you so much! This is fascinating! I finally got to experiment today and here are the results, ignore all the air bubbles, I was mixing up this batch before work and it was a bit devil may care, but the color is pretty dang close to what I was hoping to achieve. This is a coffee lye solution, my normal recipe, and oven process gel. Next, I think I'm going to try tea, then I am going to give that honey thing a try. Woohoo!
PXL_20220204_012643840.jpg
 
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