Friday, June 11, 2010

New Goats Milk Shaving Soap


I was feeling inspired this afternoon, and created two new variations on my Goat Milk & Honey Soap. The first is a shaving soap (with bentonite clay)that I fragranced with a blend of EOs: Fir Needle, Cedarwood, Sweet Orange, Ylang Ylang,(you know it's my new obsession)and a whiff of Lavender. Whew! That looks like a really long list, but it smelled pretty good to me. Of course you never know for sure just how the lye may distort it, but I'm anxious to see, er, smell!

I poured the shaving version into two mugs that a customer sent with me to do for her hubby, and the rest went into some adorable little flower-embossed moulds that I've used for shower favors in the past. The last time I made shaving soap was quite a while ago, and I added a bit too much bentonite & you can probably guess what happened. It was setting up as I was frantically scraping it into mugs as fast as I could. It turned out fine, but I made a mental note to use way less bentonite next time.

The other half of the batch has the same EO blend, but no bentonite. I'm hoping the scent will have some "man-appeal", as my product line really doesn't cater much to men at this time. I guess I'll give it the ol' Hubby Test in about a month, and then I'll know for sure. :)

5 comments:

Jennifer Young said...

Sounds awesome. Show us pictures when it is done? I love shaving soap. I am also obsessed with Ylang Ylang like you and have to be careful not putting it in EVERY soap! xo Jen

Springvale Soap said...

Hello! I found your blog through a comment Jen left on mine. I look forward to following your soap adventures and hope to read back through the archives too.Have a great day!~Deb

Ambra said...

Yes, do show photos. I've only done one recipe for shaving soap. I liked it but have been wondering about the amount of clay that is best to use. I even had a barber offer to put it to a test. He sells old fashioned shaving gear and lots of imported shaving soaps. Shaving is an art to him and it would be clever to do product development with him. I need to go with one of the soaps to him soon. I met him last Christmas :)

TheSoapSister said...

Hi Ambra,I can tell you the approximate amount of bentonite that I used this time. My whole standard batch uses 54 oz. of oils (not including my superfatting ingredients); keep in mind that I added the bentonite to 1/2 of that batch, approx. 27 oz of oil. I used between 1 and 1.5 tsp. of bentonite in the batch, and it thickened nicely without seizing. I did NOT wait until I had a full, thick trace, though. (I just kept remembering that last shaving batch, and thought I would err on the side of "thin" rather than "solid"!) Good luck with your barber-friend. I found some decent shaving brushes w/acrylic stands online at a reasonable price a couple years ago. I would be happy to check the favorites on my old computer to see if I saved the site info & pass it on to you.Have a lovely weekend!Becky

TheSoapSister said...

Hi Deb, and Welcome! I hope you enjoy the blog. It's so nice to chat with other folks who are soap enthusiasts -plus it saves my Hubby from muchof my excessive soap babble! :) I try to capture the simple country beauty of Southern Illinois in the soap photos on my website as well as here on my blog. I truly love the whole soap making process, from creating a recipe to wrapping/photographing the bars & everything in between. It's all fun!Thanks again for following!Becky