Chardonnay Soap

Using Charles Shaw Chardonnay (Two Buck Chuck), I made one more batch of the same recipe I've used before.  This includes 45% olive oil, 25% palm oil, 25% coconut oil, and 5% grapeseed oil.  I purchased crushed grape seeds to use in the soap bu they are brown and I don't want to have this soap change color.  People really like the Chardonnay Soap and expect it to be very light, like the wine.

Goat Milk Soap

Yesterday I made another batch of my traditional goat milk soap.  I made a full 5# recipe in my large pot and focused on making rabbits (for the PaSRBA Convention) and hearts (for The Arts Barn) along with a few other fun shapes.  That recipe is very nice and makes a luxurious soap.  I used the rest of my lavender essential oil and am hoping that my new shipment of supplies arrives soon.

Beer Soap - Yuengling

The Arts Barn is calling for some beer soap using their local beer:  Yuengling.  That's easy.

24.3 oz. Beer
9.2 oz. Sodium Hydroxide

21.1 oz. Olive Oil
21.1 oz. Palm Oil
17.9 oz. Coconut Oil
2.6 oz. Castor Oil
1.3 oz. Cocoa Butter

Spent Grain
Essential Oils (cedarwood, cypress, rosewood, juniper)

Tahitian Vanilla Soap

Ordering fragrances from Brambleberry Products has been fun.  With each order, they give me a sample of something that I might like.  One order included a sample of their Tahitian Vanilla fragrance oil.  I decided to use that today to make a small batch of vanilla soap.  Bars of this soap will be ready in about 3 weeks.


 9 oz.  Olive Oil
 9 oz.  Coconut Oil
 9 oz.  Palm Oil
2.6 oz. Castor Oil
1.6 oz. Safflower Oil
  .9 oz. Cocoa Butter

12 oz.  Water
4.5 oz.  Sodium Hydroxide

  1 oz.  Fragrance Oil (Tahitian Vanilla)
   .5 oz. Vitamin E Oil

The Arts Barn

The Arts Barn put out a call for artists to send work for a special Valentine's Day event.  I asked if Deb wanted any of my soaps and she does.  I whipped up a batch of goat milk soap using the Cranberry Fig fragrance oil blended with the Lavender essential oil and made hearts, rabbits, and two roosters.

Green Tea Castile Soap

It was time to make more of this very popular soap.  I have 3 Valentine hearts and 6 Bunnies in this formula along with 13 of the rectangular bars.  I used the 4 lb recipe so that I'd have extra for the shape molds.


28.8 oz Olive Oil
9.6 oz. Palm Oil
9.6 oz. Coconut Oil


18.2 oz. Green Tea
6.8 oz. Sodium Hydroxide


2 Tbsp Essential Oils (Tea Tree and Lavender)
1/4 C. tea leaves and chamomile flowers

Tröegs DreamWeaver Soap

My favorite Troegs beer is DreamWeaver Wheat Ale so I decided to use that in a small batch.  I made a 3 pound batch pouring most of it into the long wood mold and the rest in a 2" pvc pipe for samples.  Adding real wheat flakes as an additive makes it quite interesting!

18. 2 oz. Tröegs DreamWeaver Wheat Ale Beer
6.8 oz. Sodium Hydroxide

15.4 oz. Olive Oil
15.4 oz. Palm Oil
13.4 oz. Coconut Oil
2.4 oz. Castor Oil
1.4 oz. Cocoa Butter

1.5 Tbsp Essential Oils (lemon, lime, ginger, red grapefruit, basil, lavender, cedarwood)
1/4 C. Ground Wheat (bran)

Double Hop Beer Soap

I needed to experiment with using hops in soap.  My first attempt used dried hops as an additive (Hops and Honey Soap).  This time, I took dried hops and infused them into olive oil.   The "double" hops comes from also adding hops at the end as an additive.  Tom home brewed with hop flowers and he gave them to me after he was finished with them in the brewing process.

The result is a lovely soap with hops in the oil and also hops as an additive.  I used some old Corona Light Beer just to use it up.  Spicy Citrus was the blend of essential oils.

Great soap.

Oatmeal Stout Beer Soap

The Hummelstown Beer Nutz are meeting soon and the theme is Oatmeal Stouts.  I'm sending some matching soap to the meeting!  Arbor Brewing company's Espresso Love is a breakfast stout that blends their oatmeal stout with fresh brewed coffee.

1 1/2 pound recipe:



8.4 oz. Olive Oil - 35%
7.2 oz. Coconut Oil - 30%
7.2 oz. Palm Oil - 30%
1.0 oz. Castor Oil - 4%
 .2 oz.  Cocoa Butter - 1%

9.1 oz. Arbor Brewing Company "Espresso Love" Beer
3.4 oz. Sodium Hydroxide

1 Tbsp. Essential Oil Blend (Cedarwood, Cypress, Rosewood, Juniper)
Ground Oats
Ground Coffee Beans
Vitamin E Oil

Everything Soap

You've heard of the Everything Bagel and now I have the Everything Soap.  I've saved the scraps and ends and little shavings from all of my creations knowing that there is a way to recycle them back into a full-sized bar of soap.  I've learned that French Milled soap is simply soap that has been shaved down and milled again.  Rebatching is a copy of that process.  In a sense, the Melt & Pour soapmakers are also doing this because the melt and pour soaps are ready-made soaps that have been shaved down for their reuse.

Tom and I read more recommendations for the best way to rebatch and tried a new version this time.  We put everything in the crock pot and turned it on low.  We stirred everything down a few times and poured it into the wooden mold.  Awesome!!!  This looks and smells nice.  Of course, it includes every scent I've ever used and every additive I've ever used but the result is rather appealing.

Reading further, we learned a few other tricks and here are our new findings:

1.  Use soap leftovers that are less than two weeks old or keep them sealed in ziploc baggies.
2.  Put all soap scraps through the meat grinder.  This creates little "noodles" of soap.
3.  Soak noodles in milk overnight for added moisture.
4.  Place in crock pot on low and don't stir.  Leave for about 3 hours.
5.  Stir once and pour.

The result was a glossy bar of soap that appears to be very dense and appealing!  I was just going to use these for home use but I think people might buy them!

JavaHead & Trogenator

My recipes for both JavaHead Soap and Trogenator Soap are now rather standard and in the last two weeks I've made some of each to refill the suppy at the brewery store.  Two batches (26 bars) of JavaHead are off to Troegs today.  Only one batch (13 bars) of Trogenator are ready because I had to wait for them to brew the beer!

Now, we have a case of each beer in the house so I can keep the supply of soap flowing.

Farm Show 2012

I entered my Comfrey Loofah Soap in the Hobby section of the PA Farm Show and won 2nd place!

I've made several other batches of soap but haven't had time to post my recipes.  I'll catch up later . . .