Hot. Process. Soap.

I’ll admit, I’m a little nervous about the idea of “cooking” my soap, but I’m more convinced that I’d like to try offering a truly natural line, scented only with essential oils.

While there are a few that have tremendous sticking power in cold process soap, my experiments have shown that many of the more delicate oils, in particular two of my favourites – lavender and orange – cannot survive the saponification process without some damage, and sometimes a total loss of scent.

Can this be mitigated by increasing the amounts? Probably. Do I want to risk the quality of the soap by having too much EO in it, possibly leading to a greater chance of irritation and maybe a failed batch or two? Not really.

So from what I understand about the way hot process works, is that the soap is fully saponified in the pot – cooked until all the lye has reacted with all of the oils – and then, while it’s still soft, you can add fragrance and colorants and additives, which will not be affected by any free floating lye, since it will have been used up by the oils.

I’ll be referring to this old, but gold, tutorial from the Gracefruit, Ltd. blog, and this highly detailed one on Soap Making Essentials.

I’m really hoping hot process will be gentler on my essential oils, and will allow me a little more creativity with additives, for example, superfatting with luxury oils or topping with delicate botanicals such as rose petals.

Wish me luck!

However, getting out to the tracks with a pile of soap, my camera and tripod is no easy task – nor is it necessarily legal. Yeah… for obvious safety reasons, the railroad authorities, among others, tend to frown on active tracks being used to set up artsy tableaux for your fledgling web store.

So, I’ve been trying to come up with a safer, simpler way of showcasing my bars, without ending up behind bars.

I made a small lightbox ages ago, and while I find the pictures suitable for posting on my blog, I’m just too much of a perfectionist to put them up against the amazingly stiff competition on Etsy. I’m sure, in fact, I’m positive it has everything to do with white balance, but I just haven’t figured out how to correct it.

Moving on, I tried various poses around the house: resting in the fireplace; perched on the bathtub; next to the milk in the fridge (okay, I made that last one up); but so far I’ve not been happy with the results.

I’m trying a new background, but I’m worried that it might be too busy. I made a backdrop out of old maps – keeps the theme going, since that’s what I use to wrap my soap – and it’s kind intriguing, as the background is blurred and you can’t really see the names, but you know it’s a map.

Here’s a shot of Lucky, my clover-scented soap with nettle leaf powder, that I took the other day:

I’m still not particularly thrilled with the lighting, but I think I just need to find the right window and time of day, and since this set up is mobile, like the lightbox, it’s just a matter of timing and getting the weather to cooperate.

As always, I welcome suggestions, tips and feedback from all of you!

Although it’s called Swamp Fox, and was made with the outdoor-lover in mind, I’ve found it’s a great soap to have by the kitchen sink for getting stubborn food odors like garlic, off your hands!

So this is a comforting blend of vanilla, sandalwood and heliotrope that I’ve called Orchid Thief, in recognition of vanilla planifolia, the orchid from which we get the vanilla pod.

This bar is made with a bit of cappuccino mica, to provide contrast against the natural coloring of the vanilla oils that darken the soap over time.

I did get a chance to make a 12-bar test batch of 12 different essential oil blends.

Lavender Oil – A Lasting Symbol, a Fading Fragrance

The natural versus synthetic issue isn’t going away anytime soon, and frankly, both products have their virtues and drawbacks. Essential oils are plant derivatives, and can vary greatly in quality and potency. While they may also have therapeutic benefits, essential oils are frequently contraindicated for use by pregnant or nursing women, as well as people on certain medications. Additionally, and most importantly for the soap maker, some essential oils can cause an allergic reaction called contact dermatitis. Remember, technically, poison ivy is “natural” – but you wouldn’t want it on your skin!

Synthetic fragrance oils have the advantage of being consistently produced in a controlled setting, so a bad year for lavender won’t affect the quality of the fragrance oil. However, synthetics can also cause allergic reactions, and let’s face it, essential oils have way better PR. No one waxes poetic over the energizing scent of methyl salicylate, but Wintergreen LifeSavers wouldn’t be the same without it.

Orange Oil – Lovely, but Fading Fast

I must say, the essential oils were a joy to work with. Sometimes blending fragrance oils gets to me – like spending a little too long in the Perfume Gauntlet at Macy’s. But after 10 days, there is a noticeable decline in potency, especially in the lavender and citrus blends.

I used a 40/42 Lavender Essential Oil, and a 10x Orange Essential Oil.

In case you’re wondering about quality by supplier, most of my oils are from Bramble Berry, but a few are from Mountain Rose Herbs and Majestic Mountain Sage.

Since I’m keeping it palm-oil free, I used a formula that’s simply Olive Oil, Coconut Oil and Castor Oil. It produces a very mild, white bar that has almost no odor of its own.

The Essential 12-Bar Testing Mold; Soaps Captured in Gel Phase

These are the blends I tested, with notes on the scent after 10 days on the curing rack.

1. Lavender Peppermint – lavender is fading fast. used a lower peppermint to lavender ratio, and the mint is still there, but overall scent is diminishing quickly.
2. Lavender Peru Balsam – same as the lav/peppermint blend – the peru is stronger than lavender, but also fading.
3. Rosemary Peppermint Spearmint – this blend appears to have good staying power – all three oils together are nice and strong. they’ve mellowed nicely
4. Rosemary Tea Tree Eucalyptus Anise – this blend also appears strong – the eucalyptus is the faintest one, but it’s still there.
5. Anise Orange – this is nothing but anise now, but it is good and strong. can see why this is often used in odor-killing soap formulas.
6. Grapefruit Orange – both scents are fading fast, although they’ve blended nicely.
7. Cedar Fir – fading fast, too, but still a little woody – it’s probably the cedar.
8. Geranium Fir – this is nothing but geranium now, but it’s holding up okay
9. Geranium Cedar – same as geranium/fir – not much left of the fir
10. Bergamot Basil – this is nothing but basil now – no trace of orange to it
11. Litsea Thyme – this citrus is strong – so is the thyme.
12. Litsea Black Pepper Thyme – same as above, a little less thyme a little more “lemon pledge”.

So of the 12 blends tested, the following have good sticking power in CP:

• Rosemary, Peppermint & Spearmint
• Rosemary, Tea Tree, Eucalyptus & Anise
• Thyme & Litsea

Peppermint Oil – Not Going Anywhere

The individual oils that I found to have good stick are:

• Anise
• Basil
• Geranium
• Litsea
• Peppermint
• Rosemary
• Spearmint
• Tea Tree
• Thyme

I’d love to hear about any experiments or testing you’ve done with essential oils. You can leave a comment here or at my Facebook page.

I also highly recommend this post by Lori at the Nova Studio on her Top Ten Essential Oils.

Sadly, it did not arrive in time for my weekend soap rumpus, but it should be waiting at the Pony Express headquarters this afternoon.

Living in the boonies has a lot of perks, but 1 hour of postal service on Saturdays takes some getting used to.

I did make a batch of Baker Street in the slab mold, though.

Just poured:

Ready to cut:

A finished bar:

I tried something different with Island Time, but I’ll probably go back to the embedded sun motif.

The colors are spot on, though, and it was much easier to use the oxides than to have to make three separate batches.

And say “Hello” to Calico Jack, my first five color swirl!!!

I used four oxides – red, brown, green and yellow, plus titanium dioxide.

Calico Jack has a very piratical combination of bay rum, lime and tobacco. Arr!

Since nothing can follow a five color swirl, here’s the plainest soap I made all weekend: Pink Lemonade.

Just titanium dioxide to bring the brick red oxide into line. But the scent of fresh, sweet lemons is simply mouth-watering.

This first bar is scented with lavender, and the colors are a riff on Starry Night.

I’ve also discovered that micas, ultramarines and oxides are a joy to work with, especially compared to juggling two and three separate mixes to for annatto, alkanet and madder root infusions.

This is Orchid Thief – the woody vanilla scented bar – colored with micas and oxides.

The colors in the picture below came out truer to life in my lightbox.

And this is an in the pot swirl of Head Strong, my peppermint rosemary scented shampoo bar, colored with a bit of cool, ultramarine blue.

You’re getting a sneak peak at something I’m very excited about, too! I made a soap stamp! I’m working on a video, so that you can see how easy it is to make your own stamp.

If you’re on Facebook (ha, who isn’t?), you’d make my day by “Like-ing” me.

So the first one I made was Lucky, which now features gold mica on top, to keep the theme going.

I also did a batch of Blush in the slab mold, but still didn’t get the swirl quite right. More on that in a bit, though. I used a pink mica and titanium dioxide in this batch, too, but I just couldn’t get the white of the bar to show up in the picture. It’s really not as yellow as it looks.

I used ultramarine and pinch of charcoal to color another batch of Briny Deep. I like this shade of stormy blue better than the greenish-blue bar that I did last week with the woad powder.

I did another batch of Fetish, too, this time with mica and charcoal for color instead of cocoa powder. This was supposed to be an in-the-pot swirl, but the soap sped through light trace and practically went to gel in the pot.

Jay loves the scent of this one – it’s rose tempered with leather – it’s floral, but earthy, grounded. I’m calling it Desert Rose. I used micas for the colorant again, and I’m really happy with the contrast. You can even see a bit of gold in there.

Although I do like the way it turned out, this was supposed to be a spoon swirl technique. However, my soap traced so quickly, that I’m going back to the drawing board on my formula.

Since the same thing happens with every fragrance and essential oil I use, I have to believe the issue is in my formula. I know shea butter can speed up trace, and I’m using quite a bit in my soap.

The dilemma I face is that I really like the formula the way it is – except that it doesn’t allow time for swirling and other techniques.

I’m going to try increasing the water amount first, which might slow trace enough to be able to work, without having to change the oil amounts. I just don’t want to end up with a soft bar or one that has to cure for 6 months!

I had 12 fragrances I wanted to test, so I made a 35 ounce batch of just an olive, coconut and castor blend, and split it into 12 four-ounce containers. It’s a formula I’ve made before, and it comes out pretty firm, especially for a no palm oil soap.

And almost half of the soaps turned out beautifully. Half were soft either all the all the way through, or at the edges. And one was so mushy, it almost lost shape completely coming out of the mold.

I didn’t unmold these until Sunday morning. I made them Friday night.

They sat on a heating pad set to low for about the first hour, but I was afraid to leave it on longer.

I’ve only used a silicone mold once, so I wasn’t sure how well insulated it needed to be – but I covered it with a heavy towel.

None of the bars appears to have partial gel, but some are only soft on one side.

Strange, right?

I’m thinking the issue was gel phase.

Otherwise, it’s a fragrance oil issue. Each cup had 4 oz of soap before I added .25 ounces of fragrance. I didn’t mix fragrances – each had only one scent.

The scent that really went soft is Black Amber & Lavender. I’m going to try it again with the heating pad on for longer, and see if that helps, because I really like the fragrance.

Has anyone ever experienced such a range of textures in soap made from the same base but with different fragrances?