Making soaps throughout history: Castile Soap

Hello Soapsmith Nation!

I have been reading about how soaps were made in various parts of the world and at different points in history and I thought it would be fun to recreate some of them. I started simple with probably the most commonly known soap which is a castile soap. In my interpretation a castile soap is a 100% olive oil bar although sometimes anything that is mostly or all vegetable oil is also called castile soap (I disagree with this so I did what I consider to be a true castile soap). I did add one small twist so I wouldn't have to wait for close to a year before using it. I used a method called dual lye which uses 5% potassium hydroxide (KOH) and the remaining 95% is sodium hydroxide (NaOH) as my lye. Soap made with KOH is more soluble in water and can help boost the lather of this bar soap. There is a chance it will be "softer" than a regular sodium hydroxide only bar soap but castile soaps are rock hard once they have had a good cure so I was not worried about that. This sounded more like a soap I would enjoy over some of the traditional single lye castile soaps I had made in the past. This is currently curing, I plan to try it at the 4 week cure mark to see what it feels like and if I like this new to me method of making an olive oil bar of soap. 

Some things I noticed about the making process of this soap was that while it took some time to reach emulsification it was shorter than I expected, maybe 30 minutes of me intermittently mixing and hand stirring. After those 30 minutes I felt I had a good emulsification and placed it in the mold to do its thing. I left this batch uncolored and unscented (there is something so lovely about the sweet nuttiness that an unscented soap has to it). I wrote in my notebook that it was still very "wet" about 10 hours later and to reduce the water portion next time but I was able to unmold within 24 hours without manipulating it in any way so it really was not a huge issue. I used a full water portion which I sometimes do with new formulations before I start tinkering and making changes. So, would I reduce the water for next time? Yes most likely I would so I can unmold with in about 12 hours but is it absolutely necessary to do so? Not in my opinion. 

Where would a 100% olive oil soap be historic to? Well the story goes

that it is "truly" historic to Castile Spain but we all know that olive trees are very common in many regions of europe and eastern europe, desert regions such as Syria and also parts of Africa so what I have been able to find are variations of types of olive oil soaps from many places which is pretty neat. 

So join me on this fun little journey through soaping history as I attempt to make a variety of soaps as close to the traditional recipes as possible. When possible I hope to use traditional methods just to see how the process may have been done in the past.

Stay soapy my friends

~Your Soapsmith

Calculating your soap mold

Hi There! Today I am going to give you 3 ways to figure out the size of your soap mold today. 

Method #1: Sometimes when I need to know the size recipe I can fit into a mold I cheat and look it up on the site I purchased it from. But for those times that I either can't remember where I got a mold from, if it's been discontinued or even if it is a homemade mold like a milk carton or pringles can for instance there is a calculation for figuring this out. AND it's quite simple :)

Method #2: The below formulas will give an answer in ounces but this can easily be converted to grams if that it your preferred working unit.

For square and rectangular molds: 

Length x Width x Height = X

X x 0.4 = Oz of oils needed (this number can be used in the soap calculator.)

If using centimeters your multiple is 0.7 instead of 0.4

If you need this in pounds take the ounces needed and divide by 16.

Example: 12” x 4” x 3” = 144”

144” x 0.4 = 57.6 oz always round down to prevent over-pouring so 57 oz of oil will fit into this mold.

In pounds this would be 57.6 oz / 16 oz = 3.6 pounds

For cylinder molds:
3.14 x radius squared x height of pour = X

Radius is the distance from the center of the circle to the edge. The  diameter is the distance across the entire circle. So a 3" round PVC pipe has a radius if 1.5"

X x 0.4 = Ounces of oils needed

Example: To figure out for a 3" round by 12" height of a cylinder mold:

3.14 x 1.5" x 1.5" x 12" = 84.78"

84.78" x 0.4= 33.91 ounces of oils (round down to 33 oz).

Method #3: As a third option if you are unsure of your math skills or just to confirm that you did your math correctly you can also place your mold on your scale and tare to "0" then fill with water to the height you want your soap to be. Soap is more dense than water so your batch may be a little shorter than you anticipate but it will get you pretty close without going over. This method will get you the full size of your batch, water, oils and lye.

I hope these tips and tricks help you in your soap making and calculating endeavors. Please feel free to ask questions!

As always,
Your Soapsmith

Oat Milk Soap (palm free!)

This is part 2 of the great oat caper! I've always wanted to partake in a caper, this may be the closest I get so let's just roll with it. To read about part one in which I made home made oat milk for this project click here. 

Recently I formulated twelve, yes, TWELVE new recipes and will be working through them all and writing (and possibly making videos) of the adventures. I am also going to be working with additives that I typically do not work with, it's a sort of learning and growing experiment that I am taking you all on. Today we will be using a palm free recipe that also contains shea butter. When I make test batches I make them at 1-lb each, large enough to have 4 nice sized bars to test out but not so large that I am wasting ingredients if a batch doesn't work out.

Let's look at our oil profile:
I choose olive, grapeseed, coconut, shea butter and castor oils. 

Olive oil has a pH of 5.5 which is the same as the sebum on our skin so it's quite complementary and found in many soaps and skin care products. It is medium in weight, mild and conditioning. It does not make great bubbles and can make a soap feel slimy in high amounts.  It can also slow down trace and take longer to cure in high amounts. It can product a surprisingly hard bar of soap for being a liquid oil. This is the oil used to make a true castile soap.

Grapeseed oil offers medium lather and mild cleansing. I have read accounts that this oil is prone to a short shelf life and may cause early rancidity and possibly DOS in your finished product. I have read other accounts that it has a normal shelf life too so I am still forming an opinion on this myself. Personally I have not had grapeseed oil become rancid or ruin any products so I decided to use it in this recipe. It's always a good idea to ensure you are purchasing your oils from a reputable source. If you are purchasing from a grocery store make sure it's a store that is busy enough to be able to turn over their products at a regular rate, this will help to ensure as fresh an oil as possible.

Coconut oil- creates a hard bubbly bar of soap. In high amounts (above 30%) it can create a drying bar of soap. To accomodate for a high % of coconut oil you would need to increase your superfat. For today though we are using a lower amount so it should not be an issue.

Shea butter- is mild and produces a creamy stable lather, it will also contribute to a long lasting bar of soap.

Castor oil- this is a special oil that has earned an interesting story in history, click here to read about how it was used as a form of punishment. It is the only oil to contribute ricinoleic fatty acid. It acts as a humectant and contributes to bubbles in soap.

I typically also add sodium lactate to my batches but for this project I am going to skip it so I can see how this recipe acts without it. I am curious to see if a palm free recipe will be as hard as I typically like.

Remember the oat "bits" from yesterdays milk making session? Well I saved them and added some at 1Tbsp PPO. So essentially since this was a 1 pound batch I added 1 tablespoon at light trace.

Below is the recipe listed by percentage. Please run through a soap calculator to get the size you need based on your chosen mold. I like this calculator if you need a recommendation:

Super Fat: 5%
Water Content (oat milk in this instance): 35%

Fragrance oil: 0.5 oz PPO

45% Olive oil
12% Grapeseed oil
20% Coconut oil
17% Shea butter
6% Castor oil

Notes: Since we are using a thick liquid that has solids which will account for part of its weight I chose to keep the water content on the high side. I also wanted to know if any of that mild, sweet oat scent will come through so I am doing my fragrance at half the amount I typically would do. Also, I am using oatmeal, milk and honey fragrance from Brambleberry, it's such a nice soft and sweet scent, very pleasant and plays very well in soap. You can find that fragrance here if you are interested.

Oatmilk soap in test mold.

Post soaping notes: So I made the soap and unmolded, cut and cured it and am now coming back to add my batch notes. Overall I am very happy with the hardness this palm free recipe was able to provide and will definitely make it again. This soap performs great too, it is bubbly and long lasting, smells great and has some light exfoliating due to the oat bits I added.
Some things I will do differently are to cut the amount of oat milk to about 50% and dissolve my lye in 50% distilled water before adding the oatmilk. Another way to handle this is to increase the water amount using to make the oatmilk. They reason I just cut the amount and also use water is because I like to SEE that my NaOH is completely dissolved and with an opaque liquid I can't tell. It's a matter of preference really. I might also add the oat milk to my oils instead of the lye water so the lye water will not burn off the sugars. There are a couple of different options on how to work with this recipe. I was otherwise very pleased with the recipe and really happy that I did the fragrance at half the normal rate too, it was just such a soft, sweet and subtle hint. Perfect for this batch.  

If you try this recipe or do a version of it let me know, I'd love to hear how it went and what changes you tried to make it your own.

Happy Soaping until next time.
~Your Soapsmith