reallyrita
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Sep 2, 2007
- Messages
- 601
- Reaction score
- 7
I am having a run of newbie frustrations. Maybe I got a little over confident because my first 6 or 7 batches turned out so well. I used a basic oo, co and po recipe and used either a kelsie mold or a TOG mold. I got lovely gell and a nice fragrant hard soap each time. I am now using soap from my first two batches (made on Oct 20 and 22) . My last two batches I have substituted lard for the PO...for no particular reason...I just wanted to see what would happen!! Well, some not so good things. The first batch never really got to full trace, I poured too soon and thought I had lye white dots in the soap. Turns out the dots may have been just some sprinkling of ash and that soap is on the drying rack and seems to be doing ok. SO...I decide to try the lard soap again. Two days ago I made a 2 lb. batch using 8 oz of lard,12 oz of coconut oil, 11.2 oz of grade A olive oil and .8 oz of castor oil. I used 4.6 of lye in 12. 16 of distilled water. I added 1 tsp of liquid silk protein to the water before adding the lye. I have been using the silk in all of my batches. At very light trace, I added 2 tbs. of collodial oatmeal that had been stirred into a paste using 2 tbs. of the olive oil taken from the total oo amount. At trace I added 2 oz of Brambleberry's new scent : Kumquot. I SBed it in really well (well, I think I did!!) . Then, I poured into a "martha mold". I had never used this little mold before. It was a rubbermaid drawer organizer made from somewhat thin white plastic. My Kelsie and my Togs were in use so I decided to try this little plastic mold out. I oiled it well with mineral oil and poured. All good....so far. I had a little left over so I poured the rest into one of those little paper cream dairy containers....the pint size...that I had cleaned and dried well. I have been a little curious about "not gelling" so I put this one pint paper container in the freezer. The "martha mold" I put on the bathroom floor on my warm spot. Since this was such a thin mold, I actually placed the mold on a glass tray on top of a folded towel, and I covered the mold with a towel. I left it there for about 16 hours...I peeked...it had gelled well and seemed still a little warm to me, so I took it off the hot spot on the floor. It remained a little soft so I left it in the mold for another 24 hours and then unmolded it successfully. It seemed a little oily on the bottom but I figured this might have been the mineral oil on the mold. I then unmolded the one that had been in the freezer for 24 hours. It did not gell. It was not oily, but it seemed a little soft to me. I wanted to slice the soaps and get them on the drying rack but I had a good feeling that my cutter and beveler from Paul might come today. We are a bit snowed in but my husband drove down to the mail box because I had a "feeling" sure enough...there was my box. THANK YOU, PAUL. I immediately tried out my cutter and my nice new soap was BLUE on the inside. I immediately cut a piece off the other end of the little log with my regular cutter...BLUE!! On the inside...no hint of the blue on the outside...sort of a soft blue...but where did this come from??? I used no coloring. The soap that had not gelled was opaque and had no blue in it (the one that had been in the freezer). This looks almost like a blue tinted gell. But I am stomped on this one. The soap appeared to gell nicely. I know this was pretty wordy!!!LOL..but I did not want to leave anything out....any insight I would appreciate. Is this soaping process always so arbitrary???? I don't want to stick with a super basic recipe....I am ready to experiment a little bit but I am getting cold feet here....
