Here is my miserable story about the soap that is NOT going to make it to the shelf. Several days ago I made a double batch of Oatmeal, Milk & Honey soap and forgot to add the rice bran oil. Even as I was putting the oils together in the pot I was thinking that it was odd that I only had two liquid oils in this soap. I checked what I had written down – and there was my problem. I didn’t check the original recipe, only what I had written down!
Well, after the soap level wasn’t as high as usual in the mold, and the goat’s milk turned the soap orange, I realized my mistake.
I waited about a week to do anything about it because I HATE to re-batch. It’s such a pain. Especially with the enormous batch size that I make. Takes a lot of time, not to mention energy to use the oven. Well, Sunday afternoon was unseasonably cool, so I decided to just try re-melting one of the two logs. I started by cutting the soap into chunks that my salad shooter could process:
Soap chunks
Then, I started feeding the chunks into the salad shooter. I used a pot that was plenty large because the shredded soap takes up a lot of space:
Shredding soap
Next, I added the missing rice bran oil:
Pouring in rice bran oil
I put the pot in the oven at 200 degrees for about four hours. I pulled it out to stir every hour or so. This is what it looked like right before I put it in the mold:
Melted soap looks like cookie dough!
Then I smashed it back into the mold:
Soap in the mold
Tried to cut the soap, and it’s super crumbly now:
Oh great! Botched it again...
I’m guessing either I didn’t cook it long enough, or I should have added some liquid. Either way, Clean the World is about to get another box from me. I’m done messing with it!!
If you want to read more about the phenomenon you see here, I’ll do my best to explain. I made two batches separately, but simultaneously, using the exact same ingredients. The ingredient in this soap that is giving me fits is the witch hazel. I use the kind you can buy at any drug store, so it’s 14% alcohol. I pour the lye into a solution of half distilled water, half witch hazel, and that’s when an abnormal chemical reaction takes place! I experimented with adding the lye slowly with the first batch and the reaction was a lot less than when I poured it more quickly for the second batch. First, the liquid turns a bright, neon yellow, and you can see the alcohol burning off. Then I end up with small rust colored particles floating on top. Normally I use my stick blender to mix the lye solution with the oils. Last time I made this soap, it set up before the essential oils could be properly incorporated and I ended up rebatching. This time I decided to add the essential oils to the rest of the oils before adding the lye solution and soap it at room temperature. Even with these modifications, it still set up fast, so I just stirred everything by hand. So, the more orange colored soap is from those rust colored particles, and they didn’t get incorporated like they normally do because I didn’t mix the soap with my stick blender. I’m going to keep an eye on these as they cure, and try them out to see if I can tell any difference. I’m sure it’s still good soap – just have to deal with the color variations. Next time I’ll be looking for a pure witch hazel and use more liquid – I’ll admit that I’ve probably discounted it too much for this type of soap.
I’ve only thrown away two batches of soap out of the 200-some that I’ve made. I might be able to throw away a third. We’ll see.