benthere-donethat

You'll want to read Catherine Failor's book about Transparent Soaps. I've made a few successful batches using her process and think it's a great place to start. It starts as the same processs as CP, but then you add alcohol as a solvent (I use Everclear) and cook it for a while. You also add a sugar/water solution... It's a bit more involved and time consuming, but it can be done! Good luck to you!

I'm making hp soap in a stainless pot. After the lye and oils traced, I covered it to let it sit for an hour and it immediately boiled over. Is this because it was too hot? This is my second batch of transparent soap and I've done cphp before and never had this happen. Thanks for your help.

Try Ginger and Sage or a good Sandalwood or Frankincense and Myrrh...

I've been reading posts about tooth soap and using some of my regular soap. However, most of my soap is made with goats milk. I'm wondering if the milk sugars left in the soap are counteractive to dental hygiene. Anybody have information or ideas?

I've been experimenting with hot-process transparent soap via Catherine Failor's book. When I make CP, I use herbal colorings like alkanet root, spirulina, etc. Does anyone have experience doing this with transparent soap? In Failor's book, she uses regular food coloring. If I decided to go this route, how would I list that on the label? I'm hoping there's something more 'poetic' than Food Grade Food Coloring.

I have great luck with alkanet root for an earthy purple. It changes pink to purple depending on ph, but I've always had purple. It's grainy and drying if you don't strain it, though.

Try EOU (Essential Oil University) -- www.essentialoils.org -- They have a great range of EOs and the prices are reasonable. There's a wealth of information out there about the therapeutic value of EOs and the safety of some of them. There are varying opinions about how much of much lasts through the heat of saponification, etc. You can finds threads with much more specific info when you search for 'EO' on this forum. As far as scents, you can blend almost anything together. Especially citrus (lemon, lime, orange), lavender, mint (usually peppermint--spearmint tends to me think of chewing gum), anything herbal... --you can't really go wrong. For example if you have orange EO, you could blend it with other citrus, you could blend it with clove or anise or cinnamon, or you could blend it with vanilla or mint...so many possibilities. You could blend mint with lavender, citrus, patchouli, ginger... www.aromaweb.com is a great resource for general learning and blending.

I made a castille soap (90% olive and 10% castor) using a 33% lye solution and it's hard as a rock after a week. However, I just checked it and the scent is way too strong (it's for a baby). I've read rebatch instructions for a variety of problems, but can't seem to find anything about what to do to dilute the scent. Is it possible to melt it down and add more oil? Thanks, everyone.

Where do you purchase herbal colorants like beet root or annatto seed? I've purchased alkanet root at eBay, but wondered if there are other options that you would recommend? Ideally, I'd find a company that sells both beet root and titanium dioxide to cut down on shipping costs. Thanks...

Yes, the goat milk replaces the water. You want to soap COLD--I freeze the gm, then break it up and SLOWLY add lye to the chips of gm. I get the best results if I put the container of gm (that I'm adding lye to) in the sink and surround it with ice. If the gm is room temp, it will burn and turn your soap all sorts of brown and orange. Remember to add the lye slowly--bits at a time--sometimes it takes me 15 minutes to add the lye. A lot of people use gm powder and add it later--I've never done that, but have never had a problem getting a white bar if I just keep the gm cold. I'm never fussy about the oil temp. I just melt it slowly till it's all liquid and add the lye/milk solution as soon as I've mixed it. I'll let others comment about superfatting...

is it safe to store bulk oils (coconut, palm, almond, etc) in the garage for the winter? how are they affected by freezing temps? thanks...

If you want to use EOs, try an equal mix of Ginger and Sage...

There's no lye left when you're done with the soap--leave it overnight, it saponifies and turns to soap. It's soap; there's no lye left--it's not any different than washing the crock out with dish soap. (Kathy Miller says as much at her site) I still understand not wanting to mix soap dishes with regular dishes, but it's something to think about...

nothing you said was out of turn..i appreciate your thoughts and am not considering using sandalwood eo...i was thinking that someone had used a blend of vanilla and cedar or something like that to achieve a close match...thanks!

Sandalwood essential oil is very expensive. Are there any other EOs that are close to the scent or that could be blended to achieve something close? Like cedarwood or something... I just want something close to Sandalwood, but would prefer not to use FOs... Any ideas? Thanks everyone!