tahir
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Aromatics for home made soapWith all the recent talk of home made soap I wondered iif anybody ahd any good "recipes" for home grown aromatics to make your soap smell sweetly?
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sally_in_wales
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Oodles! All depends on whether you want to add the aromatics whilst making the soap, in which case they need to be quite 'tough' as the chemical reaction continues for a couple of weeks after the soap is made, or if you want to start with a bland soap and rebatch it by grating it, mixing in herbs etc and moistening it before squidging it bck together. this works really well if you want subtle scents in your soap as things like dried herbs will successfully scent a rebatch where you might not smell them at all in a soap where you added them really early. What did you have in mind- any favourite smells? I'll see if I can suggest some ways of getting them into your soap successfully.
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tahir
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Not favourite smells as such, just stuff that you could grow at home and use succesfully in home made soap.
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judith
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I'd appreciate some guidance here as well. Mind you, I'm probably getting ahead of myself since I haven't actually made any soap yet!
I'd like to use lemon balm and rosemary (not in the same soap) and as I have a long hedge of rugosa roses, it would be nice to incorporate their scent as well. No idea if this is possible without having to distill the petals or something dreadfully complicated like that.
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tahir
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| Judith wrote: | | Mind you, I'm probably getting ahead of myself since I haven't actually made any soap yet! |
Sshh! (me neither  )
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judith
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I've got most of the ingredients. Does that count?
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tahir
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I haven't even got that far yet
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alison
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What are good combinations for soap. Would it be better to buy essential oils to scent them or just use aromatic plants from the garden.
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sally_in_wales
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For the new soapmakers amongst you, my advice would be to make your first batch a totally plain, all purpose soap. I have a soft spot for all olive Castile, but thats just me, a mixed oil batch would work just as well. Concentrate on making that first batch really well, because that will give you lots of info on how a batch of soap 'should' look when you start making more complicated recipes later. Once your soap has set, you can put some away for laundyr or household soap, then add scents to teh rest by grating it, mixing in home grown aromatics, and dampening teh mix before forming it to balls or pressing it into a mould (eg a plastic tub) to make bars. This lets you do several things, you can make more than one 'smell' at a time, you can experiemnt with fresh or dried herbs and spices, and you can have fun with soap playdough
The single thing to bear in mind throughout all of this is that almost all herbs will trun brown or black in soap due to the alkali conditions. This is no problem, just you need to know its goingto happen.
If you have essential oils to hand they are the most reliable way to get scent into soap, you usually use about 5-10 ml per batch, so you use quite a lot, and of course some are better for you in soap than others, but thats another story.
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Bugs
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Where do you tend to get your oils/herbs from, Sally? I imagine you must get through buckets with the quantities you make!
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boff
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Morning All,
I'd like to try making soap with cinnamon.
Never done this before any pointers.
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sally_in_wales
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Cinnamon is a known skin sensitizer so you have to be very careful not to put too much in. A sprinkling of ground cinnamon works very well in soap, but err on the side of acution. likewise with cinnamon oil, it can be used, but you ned to use very small amounts. If you want to get technical there is a website run by IFRA (the International Fragrance something or other) that spells out teh safe and legal levels for ingredients that are known to cause sensitivity in some people
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tahir
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Getting back to the original question do the herbs have to be processed in any way before adding to the soap?
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judith
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| sally_in_wales wrote: | | For the new soapmakers amongst you, my advice would be to make your first batch a totally plain, all purpose soap. I have a soft spot for all olive Castile, but thats just me, a mixed oil batch would work just as well. Concentrate on making that first batch really well, because that will give you lots of info on how a batch of soap 'should' look when you start making more complicated recipes later. |
Sensible advice. Do you have a simple basic recipe you could point us to?
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sally_in_wales
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Let me get myself home from work and I'll post a 'how to' for beginners later this afternoon.
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tahir
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Thanks sally
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sally_in_wales
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| tahir wrote: | | Getting back to the original question do the herbs have to be processed in any way before adding to the soap? |
I usually just use dried herbs, thats it. Fresh herbs discolour faster, which can be useful if you want dark brown soap, but dried herbs stay 'speckly' which can look quite nice.
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cab
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Depends what you want out of using the aromatics.
There's something to be said for warming the herb or spice through gently in the oil to extract a scent, but as often as not you're as well off using a dried herb or an essence oil.
I throw some things in nearly whole, things like mint, sorrel, and allspice I tend to put in more or less intact. Lemon balm is next on my list for experimenting with (last years batch was a disappointment).
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judith
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| cab wrote: | Depends what you want out of using the aromatics.
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A nice smell  that lasts for the whole bar, rather than disappearing into the ether after a week or so. I'm less concerned about the visual aspect.
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cab
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Then go for soaking in oil to get the scents out, if you want the smell to really linger, and consider using a blend of essential oils.
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sally_in_wales
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A potential drawback with soaking in oil- either you end up adding it to the soap at trace (once the soap has started to form) which can leave you with too much oil in the finished soap making it very soft, or, if you infuse into the whole oil batch then make soap, the reaction and the very high temperatures reached during the gel stage can wipe out the smell. It can work, but in my experience it usually all vanishes.
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cab
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| sally_in_wales wrote: | | A potential drawback with soaking in oil- either you end up adding it to the soap at trace (once the soap has started to form) which can leave you with too much oil in the finished soap making it very soft, or, if you infuse into the whole oil batch then make soap, the reaction and the very high temperatures reached during the gel stage can wipe out the smell. It can work, but in my experience it usually all vanishes. |
Depends on how much you add and how superfatted you go. I normally superfat by 5% or so, and I rely on the scented oils to do most of that. You can lose a lot of smell if you put scented oils in earlier, so either use LOTS of herb or use an essential oil later on.
What do you rekon would be my best bet with lemon balm?
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sally_in_wales
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I've only ever used lemon balm fresh and got an almost black soap even when rebatching with well cured soap. Should be less tempermental dry I would hope. I might be tempted to add it to a honey soap, play on the bee-balm association perhaps? Certainly the scent should be complementary
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alison
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Who else makes soap.
What flavours do you make.
I am going to do a basic tallow one next.
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Bugs
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| alison wrote: | | I am going to do a basic tallow one next. |
Is this the one with fat from your own animals? I really like that idea!
Haven't made any yet, am still scared of the caustic soda etc. My mum tells me it perforates your skin 
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cab
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Caustic soda is genuinely nasty, you're right to be cautious, but it doesn't 'perforate' the skin as such. It more saponifies it, i.e. it does the same job on the fat in your skin as it does to the fat in the bowl you're trying to mix it with, i.e. it turns it to soap. Not pleasant, terribly drying, and when concentrated extremely nasty. That's why you don't want to get any on your skin, so you should wear marigolds and some good safety specs!
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alison
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Yes it will be. They were killed two weeks ago and we start butchering the first on Monday.
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cab
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| sally_in_wales wrote: | | I've only ever used lemon balm fresh and got an almost black soap even when rebatching with well cured soap. Should be less tempermental dry I would hope. I might be tempted to add it to a honey soap, play on the bee-balm association perhaps? Certainly the scent should be complementary |
My lemon balm soap was also pretty grotty looking, and I didn't get enough scent out of it from soaking it in oil to make that worthwhile either.
I've got all this flaming lemon balm weeding about the garden, and all I use it for is a gallon of wine a year! Wish I'd never planted it 
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sally_in_wales
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Oh but the bees love it so much!  Reputed to be the favourite herb tea of Owain Glyndwr as well if you like those little historical woissnames 
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ButteryHOLsomeness
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| tahir wrote: | | I haven't even got that far yet |
pssssst neither have i, but i do have 2 books on soapmaking (and a few on papermaking, something else i haven't done yet  ) 
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ButteryHOLsomeness
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| sally_in_wales wrote: | | For the new soapmakers amongst you, my advice would be to make your first batch a totally plain, all purpose soap. I have a soft spot for all olive Castile, but thats just me, . |
well, i've not made soap before but i too have a soft spot for olive soap... in my opinion it's an amazing soap for wool and other fabrics. we used olive soap as a wool soap on our daughters wool wraps that we used with her cloth nappies. it took out even old stains without too much work.
we started using it on jumpers and our wool coats as well, excellent stuff!
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