Copha subsitute?

by Ruth
(WA)

I have a lovely recipe called honey blossom soap that has vegtable shortening in. I have used copha (as we cant buy veg short here in Oz). Copha is hydronated coconut and soybean. The soap turned out OK last time but this batch Im worried is lye heavy. Could you recommend a safer substitute so I can calculate better? The rest of recipe is beeswax, olive oli, sweet almond, lye and honey.

Answer:

I would suggest using coconut oil or palm kernel oil or babassu oil and one of (or combination of) shea butter, palm oil, mango butter, lard, tallow or cocoa butter in place of the Copha.

Remember to run the recipe through a lye calculator to get the new corrected amount of lye needed for the recipe.

Good luck,
Cathy