What Do You Like About Salt Bars?

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I add SL to most of my formulas, but not my salt bars. They don't need it.

I make my salt bars with 100% CO and 100% coconut milk as my liquid (via the 'split method'), and I use 30% sea salt as per the weight of my oils and then superfat at 13%.


IrishLass :)
 
Please how can I achieve a ‘really fluid’ batch when making a Soleseife? Thanks
 
You may want to start a new thread since this thread is on salt bars not Soleseife. Also, when you post include your recipe and process so that members have something to work with.

Thanks @shunt2011. There’s actually a thread on Soleseife. Will post there
 
New experience with salt bars that I purchased. My skin loves them! I like the scratchy factor for my face and the salt seems to calm all the redness down. I am over 60 but still have oily skin. At home, I am going to try a very high CN % with some castor and avocado oils and about 100% salt. I'll probably use Redmond Real Salt because I buy it in bulk for my horses and cows. I am excited about the mineral content of Redmond but wonder if it will react somewhat like the dead sea salt that many of you have mentioned. I am a newbie with maybe 10 batches of soap. I will scale this trial down to about a pound of oils. Please, if anyone has suggestions, I would love to hear them. This is my first original post.
 
New experience with salt bars that I purchased. My skin loves them! I like the scratchy factor for my face and the salt seems to calm all the redness down. I am over 60 but still have oily skin. At home, I am going to try a very high CN % with some castor and avocado oils and about 100% salt. I'll probably use Redmond Real Salt because I buy it in bulk for my horses and cows. I am excited about the mineral content of Redmond but wonder if it will react somewhat like the dead sea salt that many of you have mentioned. I am a newbie with maybe 10 batches of soap. I will scale this trial down to about a pound of oils. Please, if anyone has suggestions, I would love to hear them. This is my first original post.

You should be fine as long as your salt is fine grain. What is high CN%? Do you mean CO (coconut?). If so yes, needs to be at least 80-85% CO. I use Avocado and Castor in mine and love them. Also needs 17%-20% SF. They do require a long cure though in my opinion.
 
New experience with salt bars that I purchased. My skin loves them! I like the scratchy factor for my face and the salt seems to calm all the redness down. I am over 60 but still have oily skin. At home, I am going to try a very high CN % with some castor and avocado oils and about 100% salt. I'll probably use Redmond Real Salt because I buy it in bulk for my horses and cows. I am excited about the mineral content of Redmond but wonder if it will react somewhat like the dead sea salt that many of you have mentioned. I am a newbie with maybe 10 batches of soap. I will scale this trial down to about a pound of oils. Please, if anyone has suggestions, I would love to hear them. This is my first original post.

I'm a bit of a fan of local ingredients, so I hope your local salt works! :)

(The finer the grain, the nicer the final soap usually feels, but sometimes a little bit of larger grains is nice too - depends on the salt, which only testing will tell - good luck!).

"Please, if anyone has suggestions, I would love to hear them."
Keep two test bars from each new recipe you make, one to try out over time and one to keep (to see how long it will last).
Write detailed notes of what you think every time you wash with your test, to build up a "soap diary" of your recipes.
(It doesn't have to be too fancy - dated notes on the back of your recipe works just fine :))

It's nice to have diary notes to look back on, and a bar of the recipe to look at :)
 
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@gacowgirl don't use redmans real salt, it has a lot of solid particals and it will scratch your skin. You can see this if you dissolve a spoonfull in a couple cups of water. The sandy bits will sink.

I've been using my real salt for brine, that way I can filter out the sand.
The batches I used the dry salt in scratched me up so bad, I had to throw it away.
 
I was wondering what temp you recommend for salt bars? Does effect the batter if it's too warm?

I'm no expert at salt bars. But I've made a number of batches of regular soap that's high in coconut oil as well as 2 batches of salt bars (also high in CO), one some years ago and one recently.

Recipes with a lot of CO usually warm up nicely on their own to the point they can sometimes get too hot. You don't want to encourage that tendency.

I warm my fats just enough so they are clear, which doesn't take much with liquid fats and coconut oil. My lye solution is at room temperature or just pleasantly warm to the touch. I use 30% to 33% lye concentration, no higher. (This is not "water as % of oils" just to be clear.)

After the batter is poured into a loaf or slab mold I leave the soap out in the open air. I would not CPOP (put the soap in a warm oven) this type of soap. Nor would I put it in an insulated container like a cooler. Since my house is fairly cool this time of year, I might lightly cover the mold with a towel to encourage the soap to warm all the way to the edges of the loaf.

In summer heat, I would leave it uncovered and watch for any swelling in the center or even some cracking, both of which are signs of overheating. If that happens, I put the mold on something (cookie rack or cat food cans) to raise it off the surface of the countertop and blow a fan on the soap.

Hope this answers your question.
 
I was wondering what temp you recommend for salt bars? Does effect the batter if it's too warm?

I like cool lye, room temperature oils and individual molds to make salt bars.

It helps to know that, while the initial temperature your oils and lye is important, for salt bars you need to keep an eye on anything that will cause the batch to heat up too quickly, or retain the heat, or add to the heat.

The extras:

Additional heat can come from:
Oven processing (most people here recommend against CPOPing salt bars for a good reason - the added heat can easily trigger a volcano)
Melting ingredients, such as butters (hint: melt these separately, and mix into the batch oils and let the whole lot get as cool as possible before you start)
The season (making salt bars in Summer can provide enough added heat to trigger overheating, even in individual molds).
Accelerating ingredients (anything that speeds up saponification will cause a rapid increase in heat)
Rapid mixing (which again will cause a rapid increase in heat due to the increased rate of saponification,).

Retaining heat
Larger mold sizes (I posted on the effect of mold sizes here, but the basic premise is that thermal mass holds heat)
Insulation (this becomes dependant on your mold, batch temperature and ambient temperature; personally I don't insulate these soaps)
Mold materials (even something as simple as using a wooden mold can act as insulation for the batch, being aware of this is useful)

"Does effect the batter if it's too warm?"
Your batter can feel like it's "too warm" just before you pour it into the mold, however the very act of pouring it will cool the batter slightly.
If you are concerned that the batter is too warm, please know that you can do something about it (see below).

My most recent CP salt batch was made in a slab mold (retains heat), with a butter (melting fats added heat), honey (additive added heat) and beeswax (required melting).

As you can imagine, adding all of these ingredients and using a slab mold was a combination well outside of anything I would recommend you do (it did want to volcano), but it does bring us to an important point ... heat reduction!

Heat reduction
(after you've poured your soap):
Remove from any source of heat (including the bench underneath soap! Moving the mold to a cool spot on the bench is sometimes enough)
Remove insulation (if you have used any, take it off)
Raise off a solid surface (I use a commercial cake rack to allow air flow under larger batches)
Air movement (anything that moves the hot air away from the soap helps; cover with fine netting to avoid dust if outside or near a window)

Water/ice bath (this is a method of last resort, but is extremely effective at stripping heat out of a batch - for wooden molds, place in a water-tight, open top bag first, and don't submerge past the top of the mold)
 
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I like cool lye, room temperature oils and individual molds to make salt bars.

It helps to know that, while the initial temperature your oils and lye is important, for salt bars you need to keep an eye on anything that will cause the batch to heat up too quickly, or retain the heat, or add to the heat.

The extras:

Additional heat can come from:
Oven processing (most people here recommend against CPOPing salt bars for a good reason - the added heat can easily trigger a volcano)
Melting ingredients, such as butters (hint: melt these separately, and mix into the batch oils and let the whole lot get as cool as possible before you start)
The season (making salt bars in Summer can provide enough added heat to trigger overheating, even in individual molds).
Accelerating ingredients (anything that speeds up saponification will cause a rapid increase in heat)
Rapid mixing (which again will cause a rapid increase in heat due to the increased rate of saponification,).

Retaining heat
Larger mold sizes (I posted on the effect of mold sizes here, but the basic premise is that thermal mass holds heat)
Insulation (this becomes dependant on your mold, batch temperature and ambient temperature; personally I don't insulate these soaps)
Mold materials (even something as simple as using a wooden mold can act as insulation for the batch, being aware of this is useful)

"Does effect the batter if it's too warm?"
Your batter can feel like it's "too warm" just before you pour it into the mold, however the very act of pouring it will cool the batter slightly.
If you are concerned that the batter is too warm, please know that you can do something about it (see below).

My most recent CP salt batch was made in a slab mold (retains heat), with a butter (melting fats added heat), honey (additive added heat) and beeswax (required melting).

As you can imagine, adding all of these ingredients and using a slab mold was a combination well outside of anything I would recommend you do (it did want to volcano), but it does bring us to an important point ... heat reduction!

Heat reduction
(after you've poured your soap):
Remove from any source of heat (including the bench underneath soap! Moving the mold to a cool spot on the bench is sometimes enough)
Remove insulation (if you have used any, take it off)
Raise off a solid surface (I use a commercial cake rack to allow air flow under larger batches)
Air movement (anything that moves the hot air away from the soap helps; cover with fine netting to avoid dust if outside or near a window)

Water/ice bath (this is a method of last resort, but is extremely effective at stripping heat out of a batch - for wooden molds, place in a water-tight, open top bag first, and don't submerge past the top of the mold)
I'm so glad I asked! (I almost didn't and I always leave place my batched in the oven for 24 hours for the perfect gel! It has a pilot light gas oven so it maintains about always). I live in michMich so setting it outside this time of year should do quiet nicely then? Thank you for your response!
 
I'm so glad I asked! (I almost didn't and I always leave place my batched in the oven for 24 hours for the perfect gel! It has a pilot light gas oven so it maintains about always). I live in michMich so setting it outside this time of year should do quiet nicely then? Thank you for your response!

I live in sunny Australia, so I mostly have to work hard to keep things cooler (even in Winter) :).

Mich is Michigan? It looks pretty cold there, this time of year, so you might let it stay inside, but yes - not in the oven :). I agree, it might do quite well outside if it looks like it's getting too hot (remember the dust cover if you do).

PS. Salt bars need cutting while they are still warm, so don't let it go fully cold in the mold :)
 
I live in sunny Australia, so I mostly have to work hard to keep things cooler (even in Winter) :).

Mich is Michigan? It looks pretty cold there, this time of year, so you might let it stay inside, but yes - not in the oven :). I agree, it might do quite well outside if it looks like it's getting too hot (remember the dust cover if you do).

PS. Salt bars need cutting while they are still warm, so don't let it go fully cold in the mold :)
If I know anything about the USA in the winter time it's that they heat their houses up to compensate for the extreme cold. So it's probably near as hot inside their houses as it is here in the summertime Salty ( slight exaggeration intended)!
 
I live in sunny Australia, so I mostly have to work hard to keep things cooler (even in Winter) :).

Mich is Michigan? It looks pretty cold there, this time of year, so you might let it stay inside, but yes - not in the oven :). I agree, it might do quite well outside if it looks like it's getting too hot (remember the dust cover if you do).

PS. Salt bars need cutting while they are still warm, so don't let it go fully cold in the mold :)
Yup! Michigan! It's not a cold as usual this time of year. But it's still pretty chilly
 

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