Learn2Soap - We Never Stop Learning

 
Aren’t they pretty?  They’re all colored with herbs too!  We had lots of fun experimenting.  Sometimes you never know what you’ll get when you color soaps with herbs.  Sometimes the result is quite surprising, especially when the resulting color of the soap looks nothing like the herb that was used.

You can view the results for the individual herbs used the soap swap HERE, along with the method used for coloring the soap.

If you’re wanting to try your hand at coloring with herbs, stop by Ellen’s Essentials.

.38 is the magic number! 

This number is derived by assuming that 1 ounce of soap will equal 1 cubic inch.  This calculation also assumes that you are using 6 ounces of water in your recipe per pound of oils.

Since soap is made of oils, water and alkali, the calculations to find the volume of oils which will fit in the mold  made by multiplying the mold area by the percentage of water.  For some reason, the alkali is completely ignored in this calculation.  I don’t know why.  At any rate, this calculation works. 

So, let’s assume you have a slab mold.  You figure the area of a log mold the same way, but we’ll just assume it’s a slab right now.   This mold is 10 inches long, 8.5 inches wide and you want your soap to be 1.5 inches thick. 

Length  x Width x Height = Cubic Inches Area of Mold

8.5 x 10 x 1.5 = 127.5 

You’ll need 127.5 cubic inches of soap.

Then you would take this number 127.5 and multiply the number by .38 

MoldArea X Water% = Soap Oil Volume 

127.5 x .38 =  48.45

And since a pound of oils weighs 16 oz. divide 48.45 by 16.

48.45 / 16 = 3.028 Pounds of Oil

So now you know that a recipe containing 3 pounds of oil will fit in to your 8.5″ X 10″ mold and the soap will be  approximately 1.5″ inches thick.

On a side note, discounting the water in the recipe below 6 ounces per pound of oils used will cause the volume of the soap to be slightly less than what the calculations show.  Likewise, adding a large amount of botanicals, clays, and fragrances to your soap will cause the mold will be fuller than you expect.    

NO, it’s not cheese, it’s soap.  But it looks delicious! 

This soap was made with annatto seeds for color.   Annatto is a natural color additive that is used by the cheese industry to get that wonderful golden cheddar color.  It’s also on the FDA’s approved color additive list for use cosmetics.

In our recipe (below) we infused 2 tablespoons of annatto seeds in 6 ounces of canola oil.   We added the seeds to the oil and let is sit for a week before we used it.  

This infusion can probably be sped up by adding the oil to a skillet and adding the seeds and heating it up a little bit to get the seeds to release the color, but we decided to let time work for us.  After the oil was infused we strained out the seeds.  We did not add the seeds to our soap. 

The great thing about annatto seeds is you can use them over and over again, several times.  Once the oil is strained out, add more oil, put it back on the shelf, and you’ll have oil ready to use next time.

At trace the soap looked like banana pudding.  But once the soap sat overnight in the mold and we cut into it, the color was even more spectacular. 

This is the test recipe we used.

4 oz. Coconut Oil
6 oz. Shortening
6 oz. Canola Oil (infused)

6 oz. water
2.2 oz. NaOH

 This isn’t the best recipe there is, but it’s a good test recipe.  We wanted a recipe with ingredients that could be found by most anyone at the grocery store.  This recipe has a nice lather, and it’s even better if you boost is some with a little castor oil.  Not everyone likes using these oils.  It all comes down to purpose and personal preference.  You can use what you like your own soap recipe.  If you use annatto seeds too, we’re positive you’ll love the color no mater what you use.

This annatto soap looks like sharp cheddar, but we’re thinking it would be nice with an orange or tangerine scent.  If you’d like to use fragrance oils, then maybe a mango fragrance or even a good peach if you can find one.  Don’t forget about floral scents, daffodil and rose would go really good with this color too!

Ellen’s Essentials Yahoo Group is hosting a Naturally Colored Soap Swap.  Each participant is using herbs to color their soaps.  It’s really going to be interesting to see all the different soaps colored with herbs.  As soon as the swap is complete I’ll post some pictures of the soaps and some information on the herbs used. 

In the mean time, feel free to come join Ellen’s Essentials Yahoo Group.  We’ve been posting about the swap over there.  Some of the herbs we’ve used in the swap presented some very interesting results.