Crisco?

[icecold]

What does this do for soap, and what do you put in the ingredients for this?

[topofmurrayhill]

Crisco is 75% soybean oil and 25% palm oil. You could divide it out that way in the ingredients if it doesn't appear in your lye calculator. The palm oil part adds hardness and longevity to the soap. The soybean oil part does nothing much good.

[CareBear]

Crisco's components vary geographically, or did until about a year ago anyway - I haven't checked since then.

I soaped the "old" crisco before the fats police made them change it, and mine was hydrogenated soy and cottonseed. Now I use either the WalMart brand which still is that combo, or I formulate with the two oils separately.

[topofmurrayhill]

Sorry, I didn't know the older variety was still on the market. Hydrogenation helps get rid of the polyunsaturated fatty acids, which is a good thing as far as soaping is concerned. However, the type with no trans fats doesn't use hydrogenation, so it would be equivalent to the oil proportions I mentioned--the large soybean part being the problem.

[chuck_35550]

Putting the new crisco at 100% in Soapcalc gives you the following:

Hardness-25

Cleansing-zero

Conditioning-74

Bubbly-zero

Creamy-25

Iodine-111

INS-82

Lauric-zero

Myristic-zero

Palmitic-20

Stearic-zero

Oleic-28

Linoleic-40

Linolenic-6

I have a recipe that uses a little Crisco in it and its wonderful. The high iodine, low INS and high linoleic tells the quality to expect. IMHO

Steve

Edited April 13, 2010 by chuck_35550

[CareBear]

remember, though that

A - the formula for Crisco varies by region

B - the makers of Crisco don't share their secret recipe, so it's just an estimate anyway.

I had an email discussion with the soapcalc dude a while back and essentially he made a good guess and erred on the side of safety when it comes to the SAP

[topofmurrayhill]

True, but I think it's pretty well established that the no trans-fat version is made by trans-esterifying palm oil with a polyunsaturated oil. Even if there are variations in the oils used in that process, they will be using similar raw materials and aiming for an equivalent result.

The values in SoapCalc seem to agree with some previously-published values I found for the new product. And here is an interesting coincidence. Take the fatty acid profiles for palm oil and soybean oil and make a 25/75 weighted average. These are the values from my formulation spreadhseet:

C16:0 Palmitic 19.5%

C18:0 Stearic 5.3%

C18:1 Oleic 28.0%

C18:2 Linoleic 39.5%

C18:3 Linolenic 6.0%

Compare that with the Crisco values that Steve just posted. The only thing missing is the stearic acid, which is just an oversight in SoapCalc (that's why the Crisco values only add up to 94%).

My point is not that you can't use Crisco, but how it should be classified. The most valuable thing to get across to people is that this stuff is in no way a substitute for hard oils. That's an illusion caused by their technique for solidifying the product. It is a very soft oil in disguise. If you mistake Crisco for a base oil, that fatty profile is a recipe for DOS.

Edited April 13, 2010 by topofmurrayhill

[CareBear]

I love crisco, but agree it's more of a liquid oil when it comes to soaping.

[topofmurrayhill]

BTW, it occurred to me that the fatty acid profile of Crisco shortening is described on the label (source: http://www.crisco.com/Products/Category.aspx?GroupID=17). This is the nutrition information for a 12 g serving:

Total Fat 12 g

Saturated Fat 3 g

Polyunsaturated Fat 6 g

Monounsaturated Fat 2.5 g

I don't know why there's half a gram missing. It seems that all fat would fall into one of those categories. But anyway, it translates as follows:

Palmitic/Stearic 25%

Linoleic/Linolenic 50%

Oleic 21%

[sherry]

So! Top and Carebear what you are saying is when use Crisco count the crisco and soybean as 2 different oils SoapCalc am I right

[topofmurrayhill]

So! Top and Carebear what you are saying is when use Crisco count the crisco and soybean as 2 different oils SoapCalc am I right

SoapCalc has an entry for Crisco, so you can just use that. In the event you use a lye calculator that doesn't include Crisco, or perhaps isn't up-to-date with the latest version, you can enter your Crisco portion as 75% soybean oil and 25% palm oil.

Consider Crisco as mainly a soft oil rather than a hard oil when formulating your recipe. Because of the polyunsaturated oil content, you should also limit your usage to a smallish amount (as you would in the case of soybean, sunflower or safflower oil) to avoid bad soap properties and the possibility of Dreaded Orange Spots.

[bconrade884]

I love to use crisco in some of my soap recipes. It makes a really nice WHITE bar of soap.

[Kitn]

I like Crisco in my soap too. In Canada it is hydrogenated soybean oil.

Edited April 15, 2010 by Kitn
spelling

[sherry]

I like Crisco in my soap too. In Canada it is hydrogenated soybean oil.

Kitn; I am in Canada to and I like Crisco for my soap. But when I try on the new Soap Calc they only have soybean oil. as veg shortening so how do you counted as I hope I am explain it OK; please let me know

Thank you

[soycrazy]

I quit using crisco never would come out right, but I'm loving the aldi's brand veg shortening or the walmart brand.