Soap that Looks Like the Ocean & Smells Like a Garden

Excited to Present Another Batch of What Has Become Our #1-Selling Scent!

Monday, September 22, 2014

Since we seem to be on a soap making roll, today was no exception. We tackled another batch of soap for the +Glen-Ella Springs Inn & Restaurant order.  We used the VERY popular Ocean Mist fragrance oil from +Natures Garden.  Why did we spell the word "very" in all caps?  Well, because Ocean Mist is right up there in the top 5 requested scents that we make.  No matter who smells it, we always get an "Ohhh!" and "Ahhhh!".

Natures Garden describes it as  " a complex bouquet of carnations, lily of the valley and hyacinth, underlined by oakmoss and white musk."  Why they named it Ocean Mist is beyond us; it should have been called flower mist, or English Garden, or Bridal Bouquet or something "florial-ish.''  But NG named it Ocean Mist, and so it will be. Just remember, it's a long way from rotting seaweed or salt spray!

The VERY popular Ocean Mist Fragrance Oil

Today we will used TD and 1982 Blue Mica. Both are from +Bramble Berry. 

We have learned that if you sift your colorants into the oil many of the lumps are eliminated.  Lumps are not your friend, as once the soap is done, you wind up with tiny dots of color which you do not want.

Here are the colors mixed in a Tablespoon of Safflower oil.

We've been using a new trick when doing Hot Process soapmaking. If the whole batch is to be whitened, we now add the TD to the olive oil (or any of the liquid oils), blend it well, then add it to the remaining oils.  It mixes really well, and there seem to be virtually no little TD specks.

What the TD blended into the Olive Oil looks like.

Once all of the oils (Olive, Coconut, Castor and Sustainable Palm) were in the crock and warmed up, we added the lye/water mixture.

Time lapsed is 1-1/2 hours during which we checked and stirred the batter every 15 minutes.  Once it was finished we did the zap test (no zap), checked the PH strips, and declared the soap done.

Ocean Mist has a flash point of over 200 degrees, so we were able to mix in the scent right away. Boy, does it smell good!

We stirred the Fragrance Oil in like crazy making sure every single smidgen of soap was scented.

We removed about three cups of batter and added the 1982 blue mixing it very, very well.

We filled the mold with the white batter first, tamping it down and trying to level out the batter.

We began folding and swirling the batter.

There is no rhyme or reason to the batter placement, we just wanted to make sure that all the corners were filled.

Once we determined that the batter was evenly layered, we tamped it down. Oh, who are we kidding? We slam it as hard as we can, over and over.

Insert the dividers!

And now we will wait until tomorrow to see how it looks.  We already know that it sure does smell good!

Tuesday, we unmolded the soap.

The color is a little muted after curing for twenty-four hours.

One view we don't normally show is what the bottom of the soap looks like in the mold.

Ocean Mist Hot Process Soap smells fantastic!

The colors are lush!

It will be ready to use in a week.