DONE: No.5 Make My Own Soap - Traditional and Melt and Pour

This time last week I was writing up about abseiling from the top of a HUGE bloody bridge.  This week, I was making my own fragrant handmade soap - can you get two more opposite challenges?  Actually, they are more similar than you'd think - soap making, in the traditional form is actually a seriously bloody dangerous activity!  Why?  Well, traditional soapmaking - or cold process soapmaking to give it's proper term involves the use of caustic soda (lye if you're from the US) which is highly toxic and involves a potentially dangerous chemical reaction.  Surprised?  I sure was.

I've actually wanted to make my own soap for some time.  While I was still working in the Film School I had romantic notions of starting my own cottage industry with some sort of craft, and soapmaking appealed.   It's cute, it smells nice and I could just imagine myself travelling from craft market to craft market having a really cute and craftsy soap stall.  I imagined myself smothered in rosebuds and lavender buds and the thought was oh so romantic.  In reality, soapmaking is done in the kitchen and involves 'recipes'.  Me - and kitchens - and recipes - we don't go together very easily, I can seriously screw up salads, so soapmaking has the potential for disaster.  However, I was determined.  I decided I would try two different ways of making soap - melt and pour, which doesn't involve the dangerous chemical processes so should be considered the easy option, and the traditional way which would mean I do have to measure out caustic soda.

I took a day off work to do this so I could give it my full concentration.   The first version I tried was melt and pour.

As I didn't have to mix dangerous chemicals together for this version I thought it would be easy.  Surely you just 'melt' and 'pour'?  I wish.  I actually chose a fairly technical recipe which involved three different layers.   First of all I had to melt the proper soap base which just took a bit of patience as you don't want to overheat. 

Once this base was melted, I had to separate portions out as I would be needing white soap, red soap and green soap - you see I would be making a heart shaped 'rose' soap so need the different colours for the different sections.   It all came from the one pan of melted soap but you then just add red dye and then green dye.  First off I had to do the rose head - which meant pink/red soap -

I then used the green soap to fill in the petals - don't have any photos as it was all getting so complicated by now I had to keep concentrating on what I was doing and forgot to keep taking photies,  Once I had filled in the green petals, over the pink rose heads,  you then just fill the rest of the mould with the original white soap.  It was a seriously messy process and I spent a lot of time frantically using tissue to wipe off spills.  Eventually though I had fairly tidily filled moulds I could put in the fridge to set.  Don't have any pics of these nor do I have any photo evidence of how hard it actually was to get the set soap out the bloody moulds.  I tried and tried and tried and I swore and swore and swore.  Eventually, the soaps came out, not always intact but thankfully I still had some of the initial melted soup left so I could restick rose petals and rose heads back on to the soap.  However, the final versions - they look alright!

 

Then, I moved on to the actually very dangerous traditional 'cold process' method of soapmaking. Again, I have few photos of this process as timing is crucial and you have to monitor temperatures constantly and really it demands attention to detail that I just can't handle!!!!  However, I was at least able to neatly lay out all ingredients that would be required.

The dangerous part of cold process soap making is basically when you add the caustic soda (lye) to water.  When you do this a chemical reaction happens which heats the water to 200 degrees Fahrenheit and also release highly caustic and dangerous vapour.   The safety advice for this stage is that definitely you need an apron, heavy duty plastic gloves and safety goggles - I didn't have safety goggles so instead used sunglasses?  You are also supposed to lock away all small children and pets.  I decided I'd do the chemical wizardy part of the soapmaking outside just in case.  The final elf n safety advice they gave was to 'hold your breath for as long as you can till the vapours disappear'.  Me - I took myself round the corner to the smoking shed for a quick fag and glass of wine!!!

Once the magickal and dangerous chemical process bitty had been done all that remained was to mix the lye with the previously melted oils and then stir.  And stir.....and stir......and stir......They told me not to use an electrical blender but a hand whisk - it took me 50 minutes to get the soap mixture to 'trace'.  I have subsequently seen video tutorials where they use an electric blender and get the job done in 5 minutes!!!!!!

 

Anyway, I did eventually manage to get the soap mixture to 'trace' (basically means the texture of thick gravy' and once that happened I could pour it into the loaf mould where I had to leave it for 24 horus.  Finally, once it had set I was able to cut it into slices and currently the slices are on a wire rack where it will cure for 3 - 4 weeks.  To be honest the best thing about a day of soapmaking has been that our house has smelt absolutely delicious ever since!    Would I do this again - I'll tell you in a few weeks time when the soap has finally 'cured' and is OK to use.