Pool of oil on top of saponified soap
by Zikhona
(South Africa)
Thank you for sharing your recipes and information with us. I, too, am new in Soapmaking and I am making a few batches of your basic (and not so basic) soaps. I have made 4 successful batches with a combination of my own recipe formulations and your recipes.
Last night I made a Goatsmilk Oatmeal and Honey soap as per the following recipe;
297g Coconut oil
288g Olive oil
288g ricebran oil
27g castor oil
324g fresh goats milk (2/3 in chilled liquid form and 1/3 in frozen slush), added with lye.
126.98 lye with 5% superfat
Mixed the lye and oils at 50 degrees Celcius.
180ml powdered oatmeat and 20ml honey
Everything seemed to have been going fine, and I added the oatmeal and honey, along with 40g EO (orange/ginger/cinnamon) at thin trace. After I achieved full trace I poured into the mould and covered with cling wrap and lid (wooden mould).
Within half an hour, the soap had progressed into gel and in 45min it had already reached full gel but a lot of the oil was sitting on top of the soap. As it started to harden, the oil did not seem to be absorbed back into to soap.
Now, 24hrs later, the pool of oil is still on top of the saponified soap. I would like to know what I should do with this batch, should I rebatch it or try and leave it in the mould for a couple of days and see if the oil will be absorbed?
Please note there was a mismeasurement in oils, with the rice bran oil weighing 24g more than the recipe called for, but I reduced the castor
to 15g. Could this be the problem? If so, can the soap be saved?
Thanks
Zikhona
Answer:It's always a guessing game to try and figure out what happened to a botched batch.
I ran the recipe through SoapCalc with the new numbers.
Coconut oil - 297 gr
Castor oil - 15 gr
Olive oil - 288 gr
Rice bran oil - 312 gr
Essential oils - 4.4% at 40 gr
Water at 36%
Superfat at 5%
This gave amounts for:
Goats milk - 328.32 gr
Lye - 128.43
These numbers seem to be within reason (compared to the ones you used) but when mistakes are made in the measuring it is often the reason for any problems.
You say you mixed at 50 degrees Celcius...that is equal to 122 degrees Fahrenheit and may be a bit high. Especially considering you are making a milk soap. Probably best to keep the temperature around 30 - 40 degrees Celcius (80 - 100 degrees Fahrenheit).
A couple of things could have happened aside from the measuring mistake.
The soap batter may have been poured too soon. You may have had a false trace. I mix my soap batter with a hand blender but I find it always best to mix it with a spoon or whisk for a minute or so before I pour it into the soap mold just to be sure I am at a true trace.
You have to be careful with spice oils as well since they can sometimes cause strange reactions.
Another possibility is that the soap overheated and seperated.
I would try to rebatch the soap along with the pooled oil and see what happens.
Good luck,
Cathy