When Not To Discount

[ninibug09]

Hi everyone,

I posted recently about a failed batch of honey/milk soap, it came out crumbly and stinky. My conclusion was that I may have soaped too cool and that the frozen milk got scorched by the lye. I tried the recipe again, using the "split method", soaping a bit warmer and not putting the soap in the freezer. This time, it got too hot and volcanoed. Then, I remembered something: the first batch I ever made with the same base recipe (8 oz. coconut oil, 8 oz. palm oi, 8 oz. olive oil, 1 oz. castor oil and 36% lye concentration), although it turned out great in the end, it began cracking before I quickly smoothed everything over and placed it in the freezer.

So after a few failed batches I am wondering, does discounting liquids make things heat faster? I am thinking that with discounting at 36% plus adding milk and honey if this is the source of the problem. Does discounting impact temperature and if so, do you all discount at all when adding ingredients (with sugars) to your soap?

 

[shunt2011]

I soap with a 33% lye concentration. I can insulate lightly my Oatmeal, Milk and Honey soap with no issues at all. You need to use lye concentration. Too much liquid will have your soap gelling quicker and hotter. I always use milk and sometimes honey.

 

[ninibug09]

So, does that mean discounting does not impact heat?

 

[shunt2011]

So, does that mean discounting does not impact heat?

It does. The less water/milk you use the harder it is to get it to gel. Hence, I do 33% lye concentration and can lightly insulate (due mostly to the honey) and get full gel. If I'm not using honey I will do a 29-30% lye concentration as I want all my soaps to gel. If you want to try to avoid gel, try 33% and stick it in the fridge. With the honey you may still get a partial gel.

 

[IrishLass]

As Shari said- yes, water discounting does indeed impact heat....and so do certain ingredients such as milks and honey. When making a batch that combines all three, it can get a little tricky depending on if you want your soap to fully gel or not.

For what it's worth, I make a lovely, fully gelled goat milk and honey soap using the 'split method' and a 33% "lye concentration"- i.e., not 33% "water as % of oils", but 33% water as % of lye (which on SoapCalc I accomplish by totally ignoring the 'water as % of oils" box and using the "Lye Concentration" box instead, and typing in 33).

A word about honey- it can be a angry bear to soap depending on how much you add, and also the manner in which you add it. I'm not sure how much you are adding, or in what manner you are adding it to your batter, but here's a wonderful trick I learned from a fellow soaper that has eliminated all the usual pitfalls of soaping with honey for me (i.e., overheating, cracking, volcanoing, weeping honey in the finished soap, etc...):

I mix my honey (I use 1 tbsp. ppo) with a little bit of water to thin it out a little first, then I add it directly to my already-made and completely cooled-off lye solution. I emphasize that because I made the mistake once of mixing the honey into my lye water before adding the lye, and oh boy, was I ever so glad I had taken the precaution of mixing it in my shower by the floor drain and using my biggest/tallest lye pitcher to mix it in (about twice as tall as I normally use for my batches), because it got hot, hot, hot and volcanoed to within about 1 or 2 inches from the top of the pitcher! Thankfully, it didn't overflow, but the closer it got to the lip, the more nervous I became, as you can well imagine. For what it's worth, though- my soap came out great! It didn't volcano or overheat or crack in my mold in spite of me soaping it at 120 degreesF, nor in spite of me encouraging it to full gel in a pre-warmed 120 degreeF oven. No lie! And no weeping honey spots in my finished soap either.

Thankfully, when I mix the thinned-out honey in my pre-made and completely cooled off lye solution, nothing dramatic ever happens except for a rise in temp (the solution gets up to around 161 degreesF or so), but I still take the precaution using my tall pitcher anyway, because it's always better to be safe than sorry.

At the risk of repeating myself, my goat milk honey soaps made this way always behave very nicely for me in the mold in spite of a warmer soaping temp and in spite of being popped in my oven at a low temp to encourage full gel. It's as if mixing the honey with the lye solution takes all the fire and orneriness right out of it, but still leaves all the nice qualities that honey brings, such as extra bubbly lather and a nice humectant after-feel to my skin.


IrishLass

 

[jcandleattic]

I do and have the same exact experience with my milk/honey soaps as IrishLass...