The "mashed potato" phase you encountered is called ricing and is something you want to avoid. It's a type of acceleration that happens when you add your fragrance too quickly, or in your case, the stearate at a temp that was too low. Since you did a hot process you were able to recombine the ingredients, but you'll want to keep your saponifying mixture above the melting point of the stearate before adding it (stearate.) Otherwise, great job. Good luck in future attempts.
MP soaps are all glycerin based. You can add more, but it isn't really necessary. Goat milk MP soap is a great shaving base. I mix goat milk & shea butter bases with a "shave soap base" that is a high-lather glycerin base. I get it from www.peakcandle.com. All of their bases are all-natural & sulfate free. Adding some powdered clay adds some slickness to it.
Sara, what proportions do you use of those soaps? This is something I have been interested in trying.
Great instructional post. If I didn't love buying and trying new soaps I would give this a try. Sent from my XT1585 using Tapatalk
Update, I've been shaving with this soap all week and it is still working great. My pucks that are air drying are still softer than I wanted so more tests are in order. I got my order of shea butter, lanolin and sodium lactate this week so I need to reformulate my recipe a bit. I also ground up 4+ pounds of beef fat that I will be rendering today. Gonna be a busy weekend I think.
This is really awesome! I've always been into DIY stuff; it's how I got into Blade Smithing. Working on my own beard oil and balm; and have always thought about making my own soap. Thanks for putting this up; because if I ever do, it will help a LOT. Any chances you'd be willing to let any of us volunteer as test subjects? lol
Thanks, I'm glad you appreciate the post, I am still in the personal testing mode for my soap and am not sure I'm ready to share it with the world yet. I'm certain there are liabilities that are involved even with sharing samples with people that I don't care to take any chances on. Unfortunately the world we live in complicates things that should be so simple. I like the soap so much, I am considering in the future (probably at least a year away) marketing some of these products. So far I've made a couple of different modifications to my recipe that improve it even more (and several that made it worse). As a green soap, it lathers extraordinarily well and offers excellent glide and cushion. I can only hope it continues to improve as it matures, but this will simply take months to test and be certain I can make a product that is favorable for the wet shaving community. As I get more comfortable with the idea, get proper liability protection, and trust my product 100%, I will make samples available for test subjects such as yourself to get feedback from the people who really matter. Thank you again.
When I hear about making your own soap, the only thing that comes to mind is the movie fight club with the secret ingredient in their soap......
I am going to give the M&P method a try this next week. If you are interested, I will take photos and tell you what my tester thinks.
One thing I've seen some people use for molds is empty Pringles potato chip containers. They're about the right size, diameter wise, for some of the shaving mugs or bowls out there. Also silicone muffin or cupcake trays.
The reason I first tried using the melt and pour base was because I didn't want to wait for about 4-6 weeks until they were ready. Also because it's easier and you can use them within a couple of days. It's a good way to try out different essential oils and you can make a small batch of say 2 or 3 pucks at a time.
Good reasons. I first tried it for similar reasons. Also, I really don't want to handle lye in my kitchen.