How have your CP recipes evolved?

[Candybee]

I realize if you are a new soaper you may not be able to answer this question but I thought the info that some experienced soapers could add might be interesting and helpful.

I started out using only 4 ingredients in my basic recipe. Since then I have been experimenting with a lot of oils and butters in a variety of recipes looking for that one basic bath bar recipe I am happy with. For a long time I was using 7-8 oils in my basic bath soap. I am still working on it after these past few years and still am not 100% happy but getting very close.

No I am "rediscovering" going back to the basics. Meaning I have found that often using less is more and creating a more basic recipe with fewer oils. I have also found I actually like the lather better with less coconut oil or not more than 15-20% of my total oils. I am more pleased with the results of a bar that has a higher conditioning, more creaminess, and less lather (according to soapcalc). Although as I mentioned I really like the lather more using less coconut. I still split the coconut oil with palm kernal oil but that is more about using up the last of my PKO. Then I think I will stick primarily with only coconut oil.

This is only for one recipe; my basic bath bar. I have a salt bar recipe; a shaving soap recipe, castile, bastile, shampoo, facial bar, etc. But the one that seems the hardest is that basic bath bar. Maybe I am so particular because it represents the largest proportion of soap I make.

So how have your recipes evolved over the years?

[ChandlerWicks]

One of the best bars I have made, has only 4 oils, coconut, palm, olive & castor. Another recipe has shea & cocoa butters in it & they feel almost the same. I've tried alot of the other oils, but haven't noticed a big difference. Maybe I'm doing something wrong?????  Anymore than 20% coconut oil does wierd things to my skin. I don't sell yet, so I don't know if my soap is even comparable to others on the market.

I didn't answer your question , did I?

Edited June 25, 2014 by ChandlerWicks

[Chefmom]

I think in the beginning people are in a rush to make soap!!  It is exciting to find out, research and then plunge in.  There is so much to read now online than there was when I first started and it is easy to get carried away with the soap bar recipe with EVERYTHING in it..Oh, olive oil has to be there, and coconut too, and don't forget shea butter, ohhhh some kind of clay.  And salt, yes.....don't forget that way cool color swirl you just pinned....but, but then there is salt too.

 

You can read and read all day about all of these great additions in soap and it can be very hard to step back, slow down and start with just one thing.

 

In the beginning I followed other recipes, with as many as 6-8 different oils in various amounts.  I didn't know a thing about a lye calculator, so I followed the recipe.  The only EPIC-fails were my first attempts at cold process milk soaps.  I ended up really loving the life and depth of the hot process soaps and so that is the path I took.  I had no clue that my first soap recipe had close to 25% superfat, but DAYAM was it nice on my skin.  And bubbly too.

 

Once I learned what I liked and did NOT like in soap I started to narrow down my preferences, like anything its a learning curve.  I read more and more, made more soap, and learned that sometimes a great bar has very few ingredients in it.

 

When anyone asks me where to start I give them the basic 50%olive, 30%palm, 20% coconut.  Make it.  Learn about it and then go from there.  For heavens sake DON'T make a 10 pound batch as your first soap!!  Use one addition at a time and see what it does different.  Sometimes an expensive add on, makes little different in the finished bar.

 

Alas, most people don't listen and they rush to make a soap worthy of 200 hits on Pintrest. 

[chuck_35550]

My soap formulations have changed to accomodate whatever plans I have for the project. One of my favorites has no olive oil in it but uses beef tallow, cocoa butter, palm, Palm kernel oil, Sunflower and Castor. It bubbles like crazy and is super white without using TD. But it moves like crazy and is not the best for swirling. Slow moving formulas for swirls or other time consuming details and medium slow trace for cupcakes. I still like Quiet Girl's formula and it has quite a few ingredients but it just depends on what I intend for the soap to accomplish (shampoo bars, salt bars). Did that help?

Steve

[KrazeKelly]

I have one basic recipe that took me about a year to figure out. Now I have started adding kaolin clay, organic oat flour or colloidal oatmeal, sometimes Goat's milk powder if I'm using coconut milk or otherwise I use fresh goat's milk and sodium lactate. My bars are much harder and I love them even more now. I also have a shaving soap recipe and salt bar recipe.

[Faerywren]

When I started I formuated all kinds of recipes with many different oils. I tried so many different incarnations with avocado, macadamia nut, sweet almond, olive, etc. Then there were the butters. I finally settled on a couple 3-4 oil recipes that yield great bars of soap with all the properties I'm looking for, so I tend to stay within those ingredients. I still play around with ingredients when the mood strikes, but for the most part I'm in the "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" camp.