How to Make Soap

If you're using a stick blender, this should occur within about 5 minutes. If you don't seen tracing within 15 minutes, let the mixture sit for minutes before continuing to mix again. Add 4 ounces of essential oil once tracing occurs. Some fragrances and essential oils cinnamon, for example , will cause soap to set quickly, so be ready to pour the soap into molds as soon as you stir in the essential oil.

Pour the soap into your mold. If you are using a shoebox or wooden mold, make sure it is lined with parchment paper. Use an old plastic spatula to scrape out the last bits of soap from the pot to the mold. Be sure you are still wearing gloves and safety goggles during this step, since raw soap is caustic and can burn skin. Carefully hold the mold an inch or two above the table and drop it. Do this a few times to work out any air bubbles inside the raw soap. If you're using a shoebox as a mold, put the lid on it and cover with several towels. If you're using a soap mold, tape a piece of cardboard over the top before adding towels.

The towels help insulate the soap to allow saponification to occur. Leave the soap covered, undisturbed, and out of air drafts including the air-conditioner for 24 hours. The soap will go through a gel stage and a heat process during the 24 hours. Uncover the soap and let it sit for another 12 hours, then see what the results are. If you measured accurately and followed the directions, the soap may have a light layer of a white ash-like substance on the top.

This is basically harmless and can be scraped away with the edge of an old ruler or metal spatula. If the soap has a deep oily film on top, it cannot be used, because it has separated. This will occur if your measurements were not accurate, you did not stir long enough, or if there is a drastic difference in the temperatures of the lye and oils when they are mixed.

If the soap did not set at all, or has white or clear pockets in it, this means it is caustic and cannot be used. This is caused by under-stirring during the soap-making process. Turn the box or mold over and allow the soap to fall on a towel or clean surface. Cut the soap into bars. You need to use tension to cut soap of this type. You can use a sharp knife, a length of wire with two handles, or heavy nylon string or fishing line.

Allow the soap to cure. Set the soap on top of parchment paper on a flat surface or a drying rack for two weeks to allow the saponification process to complete and the soap to fully dry. Turn the soap over after two weeks to let it dry on the other side. Cure the soap one month. Let the soap sit, exposed to air for at least one month.

When the soap has fully cured, use in your home, as you would any store-bought soap, or wrap as a present for your friends.

How to make soap | Life and style | The Guardian

It will keep indefinitely. Do you know of a more simplified and less expensive soap making process that I could try? You could try using Melt-and-Pour soap. It is generally less expensive, and all you have to do is melt the material and pour it into your own mold. There should be more instructions on the actual container. Not Helpful 6 Helpful No, you need it because it is the main ingredient. It is one of the most important things in making your own soap, because you need it to produce the soap reaction. Not Helpful 2 Helpful This is the reaction where a triglyceride undergoes a nucleophilic substitution reaction with a hydroxide to create three soap molecules and a glycerol.

Not Helpful 16 Helpful I'm concerned about the advice regarding a batch of soap that cannot be used.

How to Make Soap

Is there a way to neutralize the batch before sending it down the drain so that it's not someone else's problem? White vinegar can be used to neutralize the lye in the soap, and soap makers usually keep a large bottle of it at hand while making the soap to neutralize any lye spills too. Not Helpful 8 Helpful It depends how much soap you want to make. Compare the volume of the shoe box by the soap mix volume. A well-made soap - that is a soap that is made with fresh, long-lasting oils of good quality, and most importantly, a low "superFat" percentage, can last many, many months or even years in storage.

Not Helpful 13 Helpful I have a bunch of different oils. How do I know what percentage I should use of each oil? Also, I want to use fruit puree in my recipe. How do I account for that? You might want to reconsider using more than a couple of oils in a batch, because the scents will mix and result in a rather overwhelming and vague fragrance. You also may not want to use fruit puree, as the curation time is already about a month in a warm, moist covered box, which allows for faster and easier spoilage.

If you do intend to use fruit puree, you will need to use preservative or fruit concentration. How long does it take to cure? Generally, all soaps take a minimum 4 weeks for a "basic cure".

A Bit of My Soapy History

It is up to you, really. Not Helpful 11 Helpful The majority of the reaction will complete by the time the soap hardens. Explaining and Preventing Soda Ash: Thanks, I mistook the color change thinking it was starting to gel, I had never had that happened before so it seemed really strange. I made my 1st batch yesterday. I mixed the lye solution and oil at around F for both solution. The trace was quite thick, like yogurt, so I put it in my container straight away no FO or color or any addition and insulate it with tea towel and put it aside.

I check it from time to time and quite exited when I see it enter the gel stage in the middle. After hours, I remove the insulation because the temperature had gone down to room temp. Today I unmold bar. It looked ok from outside but when I cut it, I saw white streaks in u-shape towards the bottom, like it was following the flow of the soap when I pour inside the mold. It kinda like halo-effect actually. I put it inside an individual mold and just cover the top with tissue.

After around 3 hours, I unmold the salt bar and cut it into 2 to see the inside. It was a bit soft and I saw some salt clump but otherwise it looked normal. The color is uniform which is good, no streaking. Is the u-shape white streaks dangerous? Do you know why this happened? Thanks for all this great information, the picture was really helpful! The white streaks in the soap are fine, your soap should be perfectly safe to use: My best guess is that effect is heat related. Next time I would try not insulating your soap and see if that helps!

Thank you so much for the reply. Been buying that brand for a while for cooking, it was so expensive too. Have they fixed the problem? I totally understand your caution. We have found that certain brands from the tore tend to go bad quicker, even when they claim to be pure. When buying online I would just do as much research as possible.

I might just do that. I guess the castile soap project has to be postponed. I was thinking about doing salt bar for my 2nd soap now. I saw you salt bar recipe here: Can I ask is it okay to use honey in salt bar? I added melted beeswax at light trace and it solidified! I got lumps in my soap. I used a natural beeswax which I shaved off. What can be done to avoid this in future?

Working with beeswax can be tricky for this exact reason! I recommend adding the beeswax into your liquid oils, and heat the mixture until the Beeswax has melted entirely. Melting the Beeswax in the oils facilitates even distribution of heat for optimum melting. This oil wax mixture will be very hot, so be careful!

Honey Beeswax Cold Process: You do not need to include your fragrance oils into your total oil calculation. You will base the amount of fragrance oil on how much soap you are making. For example, we recommend. For more info on how to calculate fragrance oil usage, you may find this blog post helpful! This post explains how to use out handy-dandy fragrance calculator, which you can find at the link below!

If i want to make a 3. How do i calculate the oils and water? A resource that may be really helpful to you is our Lye Calculator: According to the calculator, you will need approximately ounces of oils. Depending on the oils you choose, the amount of water and lye will change, so make sure to run your recipe with the specific oils you are using through the calculator! You can make soap using only coconut oil! We actually have a great blog post about making coconut oil soap!

I have a dilemma with gel or not gel. I like my soaps creamy look. I would prefer do not gel. I have been soaping in low temp.

But then I get soda ash on the top of my soaps. I have read if I cover my soap and insulate and spray with alcohol I can avoid soda ash I just start to make bigger batch of soaps and I have found partial gel in my soaps. Can I let my soap without insulating at all, soaping between F. Wether or not you choose to gel your soaps is totally up to you. We often gel our soaps because it not only helps prevent soda ash, but results in brighter colors. My suggestion would be to slightly soap hotter by about 10 degrees. If you tend to soap at cooler temperatures, achieve a thicker trace before pouring to lessen soda ash formation.

If soda ash does appear on your soap, you can steam it off or simply clean your soap using cold water and a paper towel. Here is a helpful post explaining how to prevent soda ash and what to do when it appears: I made quite a few batches of soap with this, and have used them too.. Are the batches of soap which i prepared safe to use? When making soap and working with lye, you want to avoid aluminum because lye reacts with aluminum. We have always found our stick blenders to work really well! Perfect Pink Stick Blender: The soap that you already made is fine: Thanks for the quick reply.

• ?
• Naked to Knockout: Style Guide for Working Women..
• Saltwater Kisses: A Billionaire Love Story (The Kisses Series Book 1).
• How to make soap?

I shall change my blender and buy a new one which is completely stainless steel. I do not see any discoloration in the soap batches which i had already prepared, using my old blender. Can i use those soaps? Is it safe to use? I would double check your soaps using the zap-test.

It will be a zap like sticking your tongue on a 9 volt battery! This would mean your soap is lye heavy. I have some vegetable glycerin soap that now has a white substance on it. This was a store purchased soap that someone gave me as a gift. I left it in the plastic container and now it has this white substance on it.

Any idea what it is? Is the soap ok or do I have to toss it? Any help would be appreciated. Hi Paula, Hmm, how strange! My first thought is that it could glycerin dew. Glycerin is a humectant, which means it draws moisture from the air and sometimes that means the moisture can pool on the surface of the soap. Check out this blog post to see pictures of what I mean: Does the white substance look anything like that? Let me know and I can help troubleshoot further!

My white substance looks more like a white powder. If I rub it with my dry finger when the soap is dry, some of the white is on my finger. By the way, the soap was in the shape of a snow globe. There is liquid inside and a plastic figure. The liquid inside is pretty low. Maybe that was seeping through the soap? Hi Paula, Do you have a little more info about this, or maybe a photo? We would love to hear from you at info at brambleberry dot com.

The more we know, the more we can help! Thanks so much for your tutorial and willingness to share your knowledge! Almond Oil — 3. I got to a hard trace VERY quickly. When I mixed in the fragrance oils 1 oz , the soap seems to curdle. I kept on mixing, and the soap got harder and harder, and it got very difficult to put in the molds silicone. I ended up spooning and trying to mush it in there. So where did I go wrong? We are so sorry to hear that you are having a frustrating time with your soap batch.

Could you tell us more about your fragrance oil? It sounds like it might have been one that accelerated trace. The more we know about it, the more we can help troubleshoot! I would like to add some charcoal to it. What is the rule of thumb as far as amounts go for this ingredient or any other dry ingredient like ground oatmeal or dried camomile flowers for instance?

Should they be added after trace? Should I separate some of the traced mixture and add the amount I need and then add it to the rest of the batch or should it be added to the oils before mixing with the lye mixture? Thanks for your help and love your videos. I can tell that you are a very patient lady.

Typically, dried ingredients like powders and botanicals can be added in at trace. With the colorants like the Activated Charcoal , you would add about 1 teaspoon per pound of soap to start out with and then experiment to find a usage rate that works for the rest for you! If you are finding that your colorants are clumping, we suggest adding them to a bit of fixed oil like Sweet Almond Oil beforehand and mixing the colorant in and then adding it to your batch at trace. Talk It Out Tuesday: I just made my first soap and am very happy but I noticed I added my oils to the lye and not the other way around.

Will this soap be safe to use. We always suggest adding your lye water to the oils for safety reasons, but your soap should be just fine. If you want to double-check after it has hardened, we suggest doing the zap test. The zap test is where you lick the soap after it has hardened like a 9-volt battery. I hope that this helps! If you have any more questions, let us know.

Learn to Make All-Natural Soap For Face and Body

Be sure to coat the cavities of your molds with a bit of Cylocmethicone to help them pop right out. You will probably lose a bit of weight after it has cured, but there is not exact formula to figure out how much. I would suggest taking a look at the recipe you are working with and weighing it once it has hardened versus once it has cured. You will then know how much that particular recipe will weigh once cured.

I think the weighing before and after curing method will be my best bet. Hello, I have question about colorants. I am trying out oxides to color my soap. I used a red and I guess I used too much because the suds are red. Do I have to trash the batch? What can be negative issues for soap with too much colorants and colored suds. I imagine it would be fun for kids to have colored suds, but will it stain things skin, tub, sink, clothes ect? Also, so this does not happen again, how do I know how much to use in he future?

Any help would be wonderful. You are just going to have colored suds that may get on you and the washcloth. If that is too much colorant for you, you can always rebatch your soap and not add any extra colorants. Rebatch — Double Boiler Method: Soap Queen TV Presents: How to Make Rebatch Soap: The amount of colorant you use actually depends on what kind of soap you are making and the colorant you are using. For an easy guide reference, here is a post that Anne-Marie wrote a few years ago that I use every time I am soaping.

Once I left it in silicone mold for 2 days and it was impossible to get it out in one piece. Did I fail patience test? It seems to me that too short and too long curing in silicone mold is bad. You should be able to pop your soaps right out of the silicone molds without them breaking.

Next time you use your silicone mold, try leaving it in there a couple more days to see if that helps out! Just to let You know — I have put soaps together with silicone molds for a few hours in freezer and the poped out perfectly: Hi, In reference to one of your earlier comments, I am using a large slab mould with my CP recipe and I want to ensure I force gelling all the way through.

Previously I got a partial gel. I left the heated blanket switched on all night on a low setting to help -but still a partial gel. The best way that we have found for our batches to go through a full gel is to make sure they are on a heating blanket as well as being fully insulated with a towel. To do this, cover the top of your mold with a piece of cardboard and wrap the entire mold in a towel to insulate it.

This should help to force your soap to go through a full gel! I hope this helps. I am actually going to do some soapy research on your question and get back to you on it! I hope that is okay. I was able to do a bit of research on the question that you asked and I have an answer. You can soap as low as you would like, but 80 degrees Fahrenheit is as low as we would recommend going as Coconut Oil which is in most recipes , hardens at 76 F.

We suggest insulating with a towel and applying heat through a heating blanket. But, if you are soaping at low temperatures, even putting a heating blanket on it will not guarantee gel phase. We suggest soaping around , insulating and even adding a heating blanket on low if you want your cold process batches to go through gel phase.

What ones do they use at Brambleberry? If you are interested in getting a face mask, I would check your local hardware store to see what they have available. Hi I was wondering what steps are taken to prep all of your tools to keep them sanitary to be used. Do you use alcohol or a bleach solution to sanitize everything? How far in advance would you take these steps.

I have my cp kit ready to go but want to make sure to have the cleanest and most sanitary tools possible. After you are done using them, be sure to clean them well with a oil-cutting dish soap like dawn. Just made my first cold process soap! Mine seemed to almost solidify, I was able to pour it as one sort of gelatinous glop.

Definitely not the pudding like trace I thought I had reached! Thanks for any advice. I used ocean rain, about 1. I used the soap recipe that comes with your beginners cold process kit. I took it out of the mold and cut the soap down yesterday, it seems fine. I wondered about the fragrance oil too, as it seemed at the appropriate trace stage right before I added the fragrance.

Thanks for your help, looking forward to my next batch! Did you add any extra colorants or additives? The smell is fabulous! I did not add any other colorants or additives, just the fragrance at the end. Work in a well ventilated area. Lye is caustic and some of it will be in the fumes resulting when the lye is added to the water — they can burn the throat and they should certainly not be inhaled. I taught chemistry so have a background in his matter.

That is correct Peter. The fuming only lasts 30 seconds to a minute, but the area should be well ventilated. You can use a mask if you like. Do you have any tips on how I can incorporate fennel leaves and rosemary from the back garden into your recipe? Should I infuse them into an oil, or infuse them into a tea, or chop and add straight in? I think reading the method of making soap, has made my mind quite clear about the method of making soap, will try and let you know.

I have a lot of soap all over the house and I still make more! Just remember to use lye in pellet form, not flakes, measure correctly and have all your oils liquid when you measure. Those are the most important things. There is definitely something to being able to rely on yourself like that! Just need to wait for my kiddos to be a little older to start playing with lye!

You are so right about that Sarah! Thanks for the recipe! If I plan to add honey into the soap, do I need to compensate for the added liquid by removing some water? Honey is tricky, Gabby. But…if you add too much, the sugars will heat the soap too much in the first few hours and could cause volcanoing. And your soap can stay sticky since honey is a natural humectant. If you live in the Asheville, North Carolina area, Diana, I teach private lessons and at a local community college. I also have experienced great and dismal batches of soap.

Your article has encouraged me to jump into soap making again. Can you share what olive oil you recommend? I tend to use cheaper olive oils as I find they have more fat to them. Look at the nutritional label on the back of the bottle.

• .
• .
• .
• How To Make Soap: Homemade Natural Hand and Body Bar Soap Recipe.
• Elsa!
• The White House Connection (Sean Dillon Series, Book 7).
• .

It should have 14 grams of fat per serving. Any less, and the soap may not turn out right. You can use virgin or extra virgin if you like, but make sure it has enough fat. Buy a trusted brand! Thank you for this informative article. I always use bead form in the lye. Hi there, i am so exited about making this, but i just wanted to clarify. When you say degrees, are you talking Celsius or Fahrenheit? These pictures looks amazing.

Sure, Krista, I do it in my classes all the time. Just be sure that either you double or triple the recipe to bring the volume up or get a crock pot that heats on the sides. Most heat on the bottom resulting in an uneven cook. What do you guys think? Thanks for all this amazing information! Once it hits the stick blender, it will all smooth out. I was wondering if it is possible to use fragrance oils rather than essential oils? Will that affect the end product in any way, aside from it not being totally natural synthetic fragrances and all? We suggest you either give it a shot and let us know, or just invest in some essential oils.

I was just wondering, about how much of an essential oil would you use for a batch this size? Always good posts — thank you. This should allow trace faster and not so long in the mold. For Brenda — soap can only be made with lye. If there is no lye then it is a synthetic detergent and that is more drying for the skin. Glycerine is a by product of soap making and in china they make huge batches of soap just to extract the glycerine for use in cosmetics. All natural soaps are glycerine soaps. Please I would love if you could give a recipe on homemade acne fash wash or acne bar soap.

There are a lot of things you can add, Judie. I use calendula, lavender, tea tree and vitamin E. Calendula can help too heal and reduce redness, lavender and tea tree can be healing and vitamin E can help to reduce scarring. I have made two batches of homemade soap. I have issues with reaching trace. The first batch I ever made I was really excited and decided I would just mix it by hand. After 45mins of not reaching the consistency of trace, my tired arm just gave up and poured into my molds.

I knew it would finish reacting eventually so I let it sit in the molds for a long time. I thought the handblender would be enough. I got bored after a half hour of waiting and just poured into molds.

It works and makes fine soap, but I just question the process. Mixing by hand will usually take an hour or so, depending on the oils used. Consider it an investment. I absolutely love when your blog pops up in my email! I need some help though. Does the lye and water solution heat up by chemical reaction?

What am I missing? I love all tutorials and remedies I get from you.