NATURAL SOAP ADDITIVES FOR COLOUR AND TEXTURE
Finding natural soap additives can be as simple as rifling through your kitchen cupboard. They are usually cheap and easy to find. And because they are natural, there is always the possibility of an unusual outcome! Even though some of these additives have a strong smell in the raw... once they have been through the rigorous soap making process there is usually no trace of the scent!
Click here for information on fragrancing your soap.
Don't necessarily stick to the traditional method of adding the natural colourant at trace. Try infusing the plant in the lye to see what kind of colour you get, or infuse in the base oil at the start. The result may only be subtley different, but equally it could be very different. Producing Colour from Plant MaterialFirstly you can't add fresh plant material to the soap mixture. Even hot process soap - which in theory has already cooked out the sodium hydroxide - will turn fresh plants or flowers, petals etc. into a horrid black mush after a very short time. You must always dry any plant thoroughly before considering adding it to the soap. Many plants or flowers when dried will add a decorative touch to the soap but the ones we are talking about here will add colour too.In order to extract the colour from the plant you need to infuse it. This involves placing a quantity (?how much... how long is a piece of string?) of the plant into warm oil or warm lye solution. This should then be left for a while (?how long... again, how long is a piece of string?) until the colour has leached into the oil or lye. This oil or lye can now be used in the soap recipe. I am sorry that I can't give you exact times or quantities, but the finished effect is down to you and your experiments - this is what makes soap making so fascinating, and so individual. Here are some common simple natural colours:
Alkanet Root (Alkanna tinctoria)Colour: varies from red through lavender to blue. Alkalinity affects the shade obtained. Alkanet comes as a dried root which should be infused - it is often called natures litmus paper since it turns shades of dark blue in an alkaline environment and shades of red or pink in an acid environment. Because of the natural alkalinity of soap it is very unlikely that you would ever get pink soap from it.Annatto Seed (Bixa orellana)Colour: varies from Orange to YellowAnnatto comes as dry beads which should be infused in warm oil or lye. Cinnamon (Cinnamomum zeylanicum, Cinnamomum cassia)Colour: warm brown tones.This is the spice we all know from the kitchen. It can be used whole and infused in the oils (I have never tried it in lye) or the powdered variety mixed with a small amount of soap and added to the whole pot at trace. Cocoa Powder (Theobroma cacao)Colour: warm brown tones.Again this is the stuff we make chocolate drinks from. It is best mixed with a small amount of soap and added to the pot at trace. Like the cinnamon, the effect is often a bit speckly. Elderberry (Sambucus canadensis)Colour: Berries produce a caramel colour, flowers a soft yellow.Infuse the dry flowers or berries in the lye solution, there seems to be very little extraction of colour by infusing in oil - but this may be because I didn't leave it long enough. Madder Root (Rubia tinctorum)Colour: pinky red.Madder can be infused in both lye or oil. The main reason many people reject madder is because it contains a substance known as anthraquinones. In small quantities these are used in the treatment of some cancers, however in large quantities they can cause cancer. In reality, you are unlikely to ever use enough of this soap additive for it to have any adverse effect upon your body (especially since soap is a wash-off product). Paprika (Capsicum annum)Colour: Speckled pink.Yep... this is paprika pepper from the kitchen. Don't use too much as it could produce 'heat' on the skin (outside chance). It should be infused in a little oil and added to the soap at trace. Rose Hips (Rosa canina, Rosa arvensis, Rosa rubiginosa)Colour: Pink to tan.Rose hips are usually bought ready powdered but if you are planning on preparing your own, dry well first, then ground to a fine powder. Add this to a little soap and return to the main batch at trace. SpirulinaColour: blue-greenMethod: Add at trace.Add the spirulina to the lye solution or to the soap at trace. It is possible to use too much and give your soap a distinctly 'seaside' smell to it. This does fade over time. Turmeric (Curcuma longa)Colour: Peach to OrangeAdd to a little of the soap at trace and return to the main batch.
This is purely a matter of preference, after all, how much colour you wish to see in the final bar of soap? – bear in mind that natural colours will eventually fade out totally and large quantities of spices added at trace could be irritating to the skin. I would start with approximately 30grams of plant material per kg of oils or 20grams of spices per kg of oils. Keep careful notes and increase or decrease as desired for future batches. Pigment Colours
Clays:Cosmetic clays are wonderful soap additives and come in various colours and including them in the soap mix will add a small amount of texture as well. It is recommended not to use more than 1 – 2 tablepoons of clay per kilogram of oils, however you need to be guided by your own tastes. Oxides: Oxides are very common soap additives that you can purchase from specialist soap ingredient suppliers. Although oxides are more stable than plant dyes, they do still have a tendancy to fade in strong sunlight. The end colour result is also affected by the colours of the ingredients in your soap. For example if you are using a very green coloured olive oil this may inhibit a true blue oxide from producing a very blue soap. Amount to use: Once again this depends upon the depth of colour you are looking for in the final product. Anything between ¼ tsp up to 2 teaspoons per kg of oil would be a good starting point. A note about synthetic pigments These soap additives are definitely NOT natural, but they are very stable and provided you can measure exact amounts will always produce the same colour in the same formula. Since only very, very small amounts are required this can be difficult to measure when making small batches. These soap additives have no real place in with the other natural options listed above, but since they are very popular with soap makers and the nature of soap is to wash off - there is little chance of any component of a synthetic coloured soap additive being absorbed by the skin. The synthetic colours or lakes as they are often called are mixed with oil – never used in water soluble products and always used very sparingly. Lakes are Inorganic pigments, and do not usually bleed or leach colour. There are 4 types of Lakes: Calcium Salt, Barium Salt, Aluminum Salt and a Sodium Salt. The colour from the dye is placed onto one of these as an insoluble base to hold the colour onto. Which Salt is used is determined by the colour they want to achieve, as the Salts impact on the result. Some lakes are also Rosinated. Rosin is derived from tree sap and gives a blue tone to reds. Amount of coloured soap additive to use: 1/8 teaspoon per kg of oils. (for measuring tiny amounts use the end of a spoon handle).
Colouring TechniquesSolid Coloured SoapOnce you have chosen your colour and have prepared it accordingly you only need to add it to your batch of soap and mix well to obtain a uniform solid coloured soap. You may wish to add it at a light trace in order to give yourself plenty of time to mix it in properly before the soap starts to set up.
LayeringA two coloured or layered soap can be achieved by splitting your formula in half and making one half of the batch up to an hour before the other. Make the first half of your formula in one colour and pour the soap. Insulate as normal for at least one hour. Prepare the other half of the formula and colour it a different shade. Pour this half of the formula onto the top of the insulating soap and then recover and leave for the full insulating period. So long as you pour the next layer of soap on top within the hour the two separate batches will stick together. If you leave it longer there is a good chance that they will separate.
SwirlingThere are several ways to swirl. The key to success however is in judging the level of trace so that the coloured soap suspends within the main batch. Using synthetic fragrances in a swirled soap adds an extra dimension of difficulty since they often accelorate the rate of trace. It is definitely advisable to begin swirling only those soaps that contain essential oils.
Swirling Technique b: When your soap has reached a light trace pour about a quarter of it into a separate container to which you add the colour. Add the fragrance to the main soap pot. Return the coloured soap to the main soap pot and then swirl once with whisk or spatula. Pour the soap into the mould, cover and insulate as normal. Swirling Technique c: When your soap has reached a light trace pour about a quarter of it into a separate container to which you add the colour. Add the fragrance to the main soap pot, stir and then pour into the mould. Stir the colour into the soap in the separate container and then pour this into a nozzled plastic ketchup container. Use this to swirl the coloured soap into the main batch. With this method you can get some very specific and delicate lines of colour throughout the soap. Finally cover and insulate as normal. TexturesScrubbie soaps are very popular. They are also very useful for exfoliation. I personally do not like my soaps to be too rough but I can see occasions when a rough edge to the soap would be very useful. People with very dirty jobs such as car mechanic or painters or even potters would benefit from a slightly rougher soap to help remove stubborn dirt. Gardeners soap is very popular and usually liberally laced with some soap additive substance to make it a little bit gritty. It is a good idea to counteract this tendency to roughness with a soap formula rich in emollient oils or with a fairly decent superfat percentage.
If you add soap additives such as seeds, grains, clays or oats, whether for texture or colour it is necessary to be sparing. You never need as much as you think and it is better to err on the side of caution adding only a little and stirring well before deciding if it is sufficient or not. Most additions of this kind are made at trace before adding fragrance or essential oil. The list of soap additives that you could add to soap is limited only by your imagination. Suggested Scrubbie Bits Oats or Oatmeal Flour (especially ones with bran or seed in them) Cornmeal Clays Rhassoul Flower seeds such as poppy seeds Grape seeds Strawberry seeds Dried ground orange or lemon peel Ground rice Semolina Ground pumice Ground almond stones Using Milk as a Soap Additive Goat milk soap is very creamy and gentle on the skin and it isn't very long before most soap makers express a desire to have a go at making a milk soap. It doesn't have to be goat milk. Any animal milk would work - what makes the goat milk special is it's high fat content which boosts the superfat of the soap. You can either replace all the water in the soap formula with milk or partially replace the water with milk. The important thing to remember with milk is that if your soap mixture is too hot it will burn or curdle the milk and that is not good. The easiest way to overcome this is to use powdered milk added to the soap mixture at a light trace. Or to freeze fresh milk and use only half the quantity of water to produce the lye making up the difference with the frozen milk... but do leave the lye to cool a bit before mixing the two together. Do not worry if your milk soap smells a little ammonia-like. This is normal for a milk soap and disappears after curing. If you would like to know about cleansing milk, click here or using goat milk powder in the bath click here. Vegetable Juices as Soap Additives You can replace your water content with just about any kind of fruit juice or vegetable juice. Beware the citric ones - they have a tendency to seize the soap mixture. My favourites are tomato juice and carrot juice. To avoid burning the juice use only half the water amount for your recipe and mix this with the sodium hydroxide and then when it has cooled a little add the fruit or vegetable juice to make up the full liquid content for the recipe. The water left over from cooking potatoes or rice is full of natural starch and makes a wonderful soap additive if allowed to cool and then used in the soap recipe in place of teh water it produces a wonderful silk like feel to the final bar. 
Honey as a Soap AdditiveEveryone wants to add honey to their soap and no wonder, it's an amazing ingredient in skincare. The main difficulty in adding honey is it's tendency to burn. It is important to keep temperatures down very low to try and avoid this. The honey can be added simply by mixing a small amount with a little of the soap at a light trace and then adding to the main batch, or disolving the honey in warm water taken from the liquid content and then adding this to the soap mixture at light trace. Beware the sugars in the honey increase the rate of trace and can cause a runaway seizing effect. Fresh Fruit or Vegetables as Soap Additives Adding fresh fruit or vegetable ingredients as soap additives could be considered strange. But if you think about the wonderful natural skincare properties many fruits and vegetables have, avocado or banana for example, then it begins to make more sense. Some vegetables are not suitable as soap additives unless they have been cooked first. Pumpkin is one of these. Carrot is best juiced but could be cooked and then added to the soap mix. Do remember that adding vegetables is only possible if they have been pureed first and can be well incorporated into the soap mix. How well they puree should help you decide whether they need cooking or not. Pockets of vegetable matter in the final soap will go rancid very quickly. Even if well incorporated the shelf life of the soap will be severely reduced by the addition of fresh produce like this. Only do this if you are making very small batches that you intend to use immediately. Had enough of Soap Additives? Return to the Soap Page
|
