Soap Fixed by Hot Process Method

This soap making was a bit adventurous. I was making a soap with natural colorants- Himalayan Rhubarb Root infused in olive oil, plus a bit of indigo to make a purple-red soap. Everything was ready, but my stick blender refused to work. I ended up mixing the batter by hand with a whisk. It was slow, but eventually, the soap looked ready to pour. The next morning, my soap was soft, crumbly, and the pH was high - obviously, it hadn’t fully emulsified. I saved the batch using hot process. As I cooked it on low heat, the soap’s colors looked like a “meat soap,” whith a rustic, reddish-pink. I spooned it into mold, and although it wasn’t what I originally planned, the result was quite good. Recipe I formulated this recipe mainly to use up the oils and butters I already had at home. While the recipe works really well, my main goal was to use what I had on hand- if I’d had other oils available, I probably would have used those instead. That said, I carefully considered the properties of each oil to balance hard and soft oils, as well as their cleansing and moisturizing qualities, to create a gentle and nourishing bar of soap. The finished soap is on the softer side and needs a few weeks to fully cure. The combined linoleic and linolenic content is a little on the higher side- still under 15- so there is a slight increase in the chance of DOS. Because of this, I didn’t include any superfat. Here in Northern parts of Australia, the hot and humid conditions around December can also make DOS more likely, so keeping the superfat at 0% was intentional. These soaps are few in number, for personal use, and will be used up fairly quickly. Ingredients and measurements: Olive oil: 132 gr (This included 106 gr of plain olive oil, and 26 gr of infused oil) Coconut oil: 66 gr Shea butter: 11 gr Grapeseed oil: 11 gr NaOH: 33 gr Water: 49 ml ** (Read below) Superfat: 0% (Total oil weight: 220 gr) **Soap Maker’s Note: This recipe uses 49 ml of water, which is a 22% water-to-oil ratio (a severe water discount). Water discounting makes soap trace and thicken faster, helps it harden more quickly, and reduces curing time- but it also leaves less time for swirls and may cause the batter to seize. 👉 It is recommended to always run your formula through a soap calculator (such as SoapCalc) to adjust the correct water and lye weight for your oils. How I infused Rhubarb Root Powder in olive oil: https://youtu.be/nim2shz4ziY Links to learn more about “meat soap”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23Go7gMnw6o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVdyL0QxpHk Links to learn more about making soap without a stick blender: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHtcGLTslnw https://youtu.be/nLV1yM6886w?si=TOq4c8LR44bKnsQ2 Music credit: Epidemic Sound- Blooming Meadows- Arden Forest https://www.epidemicsound.com/music/tracks/f9323660-1557-4148-be57-de1b017d2d4a/ #handmadesoap #coldprocessedsoap #coldprocesssoap #naturalsoap #hotprocesssoap #soapmakingathome #soapmaker