My First Cream Soap Experience

Terry Nisbet Nizzy - Central Coast, NSW, Australia February 2006

My Soapmaker friend Lisa WB arrived on our doorstep right on time. So with a quick comparing notes we had researched on the internet, plus the fact of not having ever attempted this before, we bravely marched into the unknown. Lisa WB is an accomplished soap maker here in Australia, she is also a close friend. http://www.australiansoapmaker.info./ A real talented web mistress and designer. We have a hilarious time when we get together to make soap and two minds are always better than one, especially on this occasion. This is the recipe Olivia Seife from The Whisk soap forum sent to me. No doubt after learning the basics of making cream soap we can adjust the recipe to whatever oils take our fancy. 850g 567g 283g 283g Tallow Stearic Lard Virgin Coconut Oil (plugged in where the hazelnut is, to prevent drying and it worked!)

60.5g Caustic Soda 288g Potassium Hydroxide 3000g of Water 595g Vegetable Glycerine We weighed the ingredients as per the recipe, placed the large stainless steel pot onto the hotplate and began to heat it up. Keeping the temperature low because the stainless steel is thin and not wanting to burn the mix. After about 5 minutes of low heating I started to read those instructions and there at number 6 was a sentence about 'returning the soap pot to the LARGER pot.......Oh No! ...Should we be doing this in a double boiler?? More quick reading and sure enough ...number 7 in our list of instructions confirms it should be in a double boiler or a pot within a pot. Lucky the temperature was only on low. It turns out that the explanation of the process the mixing of the ingredients and the process the mix is going through is excellent here at 'Skin Esscentuals' http://home.earthlink.net/~skinesscentuals/Cream.html Everything that was mentioned there, was just as it happened with us making the cream soap. I'm not sure who the author is but I can tell you it helped enormously We left it in the double boiler for about 3 hours then as it began to cool it was forming a thicker layer on the surface, not a skin but a thick layer and we just stirred now again then put the lid on. 4 hours later it is still warmish but thicker. I have had the pot sitting outside with the lid on to cool it faster, remember it's summer over here in Australia :-) I have taken photos at the different stages and will post them here when it has finished cooling. I think we were successful It's still a little warm and they say to let it sit for 24 hours but at this stage the mix resembles thick treacle, molasses. When lifted with the spoon it forms soft folds on the surface when dribbled back into the mix and after a few seconds the surface is smooth again. Is this correct? It will probably get slightly thicker overnight.??? It's not a 'cream' as like a moisturiser cream or whipped fresh cream. It's lathering well already and can only improve with age. I didn't fragrance or colour the mix, its an semi opaque look about it. If you wanted it whiter Olivia suggested some Titanium

Dioxide. I like the idea of making a batch then add the fragrance to smaller portions of the soap on demand. There is hardly any odour to the plain mix. Would be good in a squeeze bottle. Lisa and I have decided to follow up this ''creamed' process to see what else is around... any tips would be appreciated :-)

Our Method & Photos

This is how we proceeded, the blind leading the blind and reading from two sources we managed to end up with this.... We weighed out the ingredients then followed procedure to mix them together. When we added the caustic/water mix it went white instantly, Lisa stick blended it and we watched it form a sort of a graininess. Photo 1

Whipped some more and it changed again, still looks grainy but dont worry this will soon smooth out as you whip more with the stick blender. Photo 2

After about 20 minutes of heating in the double boiler the mix smoothed out and appeared even whiter, much smoother now. Photo 3

After 2 hours of cooking it formed thicker on the surface but still like warm honey consistency underneath. Eventually all of these soft lumps would be incorporated into the mix as it cooled further. Photo 4

This is how it looked after cooling for about 30 minutes. It was getting thicker and more difficult to stir but this relaxes later on. Photo5

The following morning it has thinned a little, sort of relaxed. Photo 6

We decided that the mix must have needed more heating so we took a little out and placed it in the microwave till it heated. we took it out and it was instant, the mix was now thick. You can see the bowl on the left is how it looked the following morning then the bowl on the right is after heating in the microwave. So we decided we would place it back it the double boiler. Photo 7

After another hour cooking you can see the vast difference. Photo 8

A close up of the thickened soap. Photo 9

And finally a shot of my double boiler set up. I understand there is an Oven method too! You place the stainless steel pot in the oven with the lid on and it shortens the cooking time. Photo 10

OK we now have this thick pot of soap...What do we do now? Do we wait a week then whip it? When I whip it I will add to this PDF file. It lathers really well already so it can only get better with age. Since making this I have joined the Cream Soap list at Yahoo Groups. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CreamSoap Im hoping to learn a lot more now :-) _________________ Cheers Terry Nisbet- aka Nizzy

http://members.ozemail.com.au/~nizzy/soap/

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