Tips on How to Change and Customize a Soap Recipe
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Guidance on how to change a soap recipe to omit or add an oil, change the color, calculate a water discount, or use a different fragrance. If you plan to customize a soap recipe, such as switching to ingredients you have or prefer, these tips show you how.
I share many cold-process soap recipes here on Lovely Greens. Everything from simple goat milk soap to 100% olive oil soap, to how to make pretty Herb Garden Soap. Each recipe specifies the amounts and types of main oils, lye, water, color, fragrance, and other ingredients. The directions, including temperature and technique, are also very specific. Still, the most common question I get is how to change the recipe.
There are valid reasons to change some of my recipes, or any others you come across. In this piece, I’ll show you how. If you want to create your own soap recipes from scratch, you’ll want to learn how to formulate a soap recipe.
Reasons to Change a Soap Recipe
Sometimes making a soap recipe can be difficult because regional differences make ingredients hard to source. For example, soap makers in Africa have emailed to say it’s difficult to source or buy olive oil, and when it is available, it’s often very expensive. Other soap makers don’t want to use palm oil (here’s why and my own stance on it). Others want to avoid ingredients they or their family are sensitive to. Here are some of the reasons that people have given me as to why they’d like to change a soap recipe:
- Allergy or skin sensitivity
- Cost and affordability
- Availability of ingredients
- Prefer Vegan or Vegetarian ingredients
- Prefer all-natural ingredients
- Avoiding Palm oil (these are my palm-oil-free soap recipes)
- Would like to add an ingredient they already have
Soap Recipes are Chemical Formulas
Most people who ask me about changing a soap recipe are beginners. If you’re also a beginner, read this carefully: changing a soap recipe isn’t like giving a cupcake recipe personal flair. Soap making is chemistry, and you have to make changes deliberately and safely. Soap recipes aren’t true “recipes”; they’re chemical formulas that create natural soap.
An experienced soap maker can create and adjust soap recipes because they understand which oils and oil combinations make a good bar. Then they calculate the correct amount of lye needed to transform the oils into soap. If you’re just starting out, I recommend using simple beginner soap recipes at first. If you can’t find one that suits you on Lovely Greens, check out these soapmaking books.
Oil + Lye = Soap
In soap making, the oils and lye go through a chemical process called saponification. Through this process, they bond together and transform into soap. It’s a little hard to understand, so let’s look at a food recipe. When you make a cake and serve a slice, the flour, eggs, and other ingredients you used are still in that piece of cake. This isn’t the case when you make a batch of cold-process soap.
When oils and fats interact with lye, the compounds break apart at the molecular level and reform with atoms from the sodium hydroxide. This process is called saponification, and once it happens, you can’t go back. The oils and fats are irreversibly changed into soap compounds.
For example, olive oil that saponifies in a soap recipe becomes sodium olivate, a new compound. We call it olive oil soap; however, it’s no longer olive oil and can never be again. All other oils change too: coconut oil becomes sodium cocoate, sunflower oil becomes sodium sunflowerate, and so on.
In a soap recipe, you choose each oil for a reason, and you calculate the lye (NaOH or KOH) to the exact amount needed to saponify it. In most cases, you’ll also use a superfat. This means a certain percentage of extra oil in your recipe won’t go through saponification. It stays in your soap, adding conditioning properties to your bars.
Changing One Oil for Another
Each oil type requires a specific lye ratio to make soap. You can’t just add a dash of this oil to the recipe, or take a bit of this out, or replace it with something else. It’s not that easy, and being careless in soap making can be dangerous. Different oils require different amounts of sodium hydroxide (lye) to turn into soap.
If you change a soap recipe’s ingredients without accounting for the change in Sodium hydroxide, you can end up with a failed batch. Or worse, a batch of soap that could cause skin irritation.
Beginner Soap Making Series
Most of the soap recipes I share are small 1-lb (454g) batches with simple soaping oils, simple techniques, and natural ingredients. You can even find many of those ingredients at local shops. Head over here for my tips on where to source soap ingredients.
If you’re a beginner and want to make soap, start with my Natural Soap Making for Beginners series. It gives you a solid overview and some basic soap-making recipes. I’d advise all beginners to use tried-and-tested recipes before formulating their own.
How to Customize a Soap Recipe
If you need to change a recipe, start by using a soap calculator. The goal is to recreate the original soap recipe, then edit it from there. Start by selecting options for the first and second fields: the type of lye you’re using (NaOH for cold process soapmaking) and the units of measurement and original batch size. Make sure the values in the recipe match the unit (pounds, ounces, grams).
In section 3, choose the ‘Water : Lye Ratio’ radio button and type 2:1 into the field.
Move on to section 4 and enter the superfat percentage of the original recipe. If that’s not clear, use 5%. Leave the fragrance fields blank.
Skip section 5 and then add all the ingredients to the form in section 6. If the recipe includes percentages, use that column and enter those figures per oil; if not, choose the column with units (in the above case, g for grams). Then you add the exact amounts called for in the original soap recipe.
When all the ingredients are in place, click the button next to section 7 – it says ‘1. Calculate Recipe’. After that, click the button ‘2. View or Print Recipe’. A new tab or window will open with your base recipe laid out. If you see inconsistencies between the lye and water amounts and the original recipe, go back and tweak it.
Adjusting Fields to Get the Correct Lye and Water Amounts
If the lye and water amounts differ, head back to the first page and adjust the values in sections 3 and 4. Section 3 explains how much water the recipe calls for, and it offers three ways to calculate it. Most recipes use a 2:1 water-to-lye ratio, which is about a 33.3% lye concentration. Use that as a base point and adjust from there. Ignore the radio button of ‘water as a % of oils’—this is a less accurate and old-fashioned way to calculate water content in soap recipes.
Section 4 controls how much lye the recipe needs. Ignore the part about fragrance and focus on the Superfat value. A superfat is the percentage of oils that do not saponify and stay untouched in the soap as a conditioning agent. Handmade soap is typically made with a superfat of between 5-7%. However, you will find some recipes with lower or higher superfat. Solid dish soap, for example, usually has a 0% superfat, while shampoo bars can have up to 15%.
Keep adjusting the values in sections 3 and 4, clicking ‘calculate recipe’ and ‘view or print recipe’ each time to see what the recipe looks like after. Do this until the lye and water amounts match the original recipe.
Matching the Original Soap Recipe’s Attributes
Once you have the original recipe in front of you, start adjusting. If you want your new soap recipe to match the original in hardness, lather, conditioning, and cleansing, take some notes. Jot down the original weight of oils, values for water and superfat, and the soap quality values. Any changes you make should still reflect similar values for those fields.
Now remove the ingredient(s) that you’d like to omit and/or add the ones you’d like to use. Make sure that the total amount by weight of the entire recipe remains the same (section 2). It can take time to adjust the oils until you get a workable recipe.
In most cases, you will need to combine other oils to replace a single type. Also, aim for a 40:60 ratio of saturated fats (mainly solid oils) to unsaturated fats (mainly liquid oils). This isn’t an absolute rule, but a good best practice for formulating soap recipes. You can see this ratio in the soap calculator at the bottom of section 5.
Few oils are directly interchangeable, but tallow and palm oil are an exception. They have very similar saponification values. That’s why you’ll sometimes see palm oil called vegetable tallow. Their fatty acid profiles are also very similar.
Choosing Oil Replacements
You’ll notice a column in section 5 of the free soap calculator I’m using that lists a lot of chemical-looking words. This section is the fatty acid profile for your soap recipe. Each one of those words, Lauric acid, Myristic acid, etc., represents the individual amount of that fatty acid in the oils you’re using. It calculates how much of each is in your entire recipe.
Oils are made up of fatty acids, and each gives your bars a specific property. These include silky lather, bubbliness, conditioning and moisturizing, hardness, stable lather, and more.
This chart lists the fatty acids you’ll use in soap making, along with the qualities they’ll give your soap. It also lists oils high in particular fatty acids. They are arranged in approximate order of those that contain the highest amounts. Some of these oils are exotic, expensive, or have ethical or environmental issues, so I’ve highlighted my pick for each in bold.
Fatty Acids in Soaping Oils
| Fatty acid | Properties that it gives to soap | Oils that contain this fatty acid |
| Lauric acid | Hardness | Palm kernel, coconut, babassu |
| Linoleic acid | Conditioning Moisturizing Silkiness | Evening primrose, grapeseed, poppy seed, passion fruit, hemp, black cumin, cottonseed, corn, rapeseed, hempseed, safflower, soybean |
| Linolenic acid | Conditioning Moisturizing Mildness | Hemp, flax, but found in smaller and more stable amounts in oils like olive and sunflower |
| Myristic acid | Hardness, cleansing, fluffy lather | Coconut, palm kernel, babassu |
| Oleic acid | Conditioning Moisturizing Slippery-ness | Sunflower, camellia, olive oil, hazelnut, shea oil, sweet almond, apricot kernel, peach kernel, apricot kernel, canola, avocado, peanut, shea butter |
| Palmic acid | Hardness Creaminess Stable lather | Stearic acid, palm, soy wax, cocoa butter, tallow |
| Ricinoleic acid | Conditioning Stable lather | Castor |
| Stearic acid | Hardness Creaminess Stable lather | Stearic acid, sal butter, Illipe butter, shea butter, mango butter, cocoa butter |
Fatty Acid Ranges
These are good targets to work toward, along with oils rich in that fatty acid:
- Lauric acid at 15% — Using more can cause overdrying
- Myristic acid at 7% — Using more can cause overdrying
- Palmitic acid at 15% — Using more can cause overdrying
- Stearic acid at 7% — Using more can cause overdrying
- Ricinoleic acid at 5-10% — Using too much castor oil can create a sticky bar
- Oleic acid at 36% — Using more can impede lather
- Linoleic acid at 10% — Using more can cause DOS (Dreaded Orange Spot)
- Linolenic at 0-1%
Main Soapmaking Oils
You could spend days fiddling with the soap calculator and finding the perfect recipe. When creating a recipe, I look closely at the soap qualities field, but I focus even more on the fatty acid percentages. I try to make sure the values in my recipe fall within their recommended ranges.
I’ve heard more than once that soap makers have created great recipes that don’t fit these ranges perfectly. However, they are a good standard, and I haven’t had a bad recipe when I follow their guidelines. Here are some of the most common and useful soapmaking oils and their recommended usage rates in a soap recipe.
- Coconut oil at 15-30%
- Olive oil at up to 100%
- Palm oil at up to 20-30% (please use Sustainable Palm oil though)
- Sunflower oil at 5-15%
- Canola oil at 5-15%
- Shea butter at 5-25%
- Castor oil at 3-10%
Changing the Fragrance in a Soap Recipe
Sometimes, when you want to change a soap recipe, you just want to use a different scent. With essential oils and fragrance oils, you need to be just as careful to use the right amount. Too little, and the scent will be faint. Too much, and it could cause rashes and other skin irritations.
Fragrance oils are not natural and are patented perfume products. Some are only suitable for candles, while others are skin-safe. Each one includes a recommendation for how much you can use in leave-on skin products like lotion and in wash-off products like soap. Always follow these guidelines. If the usage rate for your fragrance is not clear, contact the manufacturer.
Calculating Fragrance Amounts
Some people might be confused about how much fragrance contributes to that percentage. Here’s how to calculate it: If the maximum usage rate for a fragrance oil is 3%, it’s 3% of the total soap recipe, including the weight of soapmaking oils, lye, and fragrance. You don’t include the water content in this calculation because most of it evaporates during curing.
If you’re making a 454g (1lb) batch, you can use up to 13.62g of fragrance. You can also calculate how much fragrance you can use using that field in your soap calculator. Set the fragrance field to reflect the percentage you can use in your soap. It’s in g/kg, so 30 g would be 3% of 1 kg.
Changing the Essential Oils in a Soap Recipe
When using fragrance oils in soap, you tend to stick with just one. They’re made to stand alone as a scent. Essential oils are different. You can use many on their own, but the vast majority are much better worked into blends. Essential oil blends use two or more oils and work best with a top, middle, and base note. In another piece, I go into detail about how to create blends and how much essential oil to use in soap recipes.
Soap Colorants
You might find a soap recipe you’re interested in, but you want to change the color or color ingredients. To do this, remove the soap colorant from the recipe and replace it with another. You can also choose to leave the color out completely.
Countless ingredients can color handmade soap, but some are natural soap colorants, and others are synthetic. Here are some that you might come across:
- Clays—natural colorants derived from clay soils. More on clay soapmaking.
- Mineral colors—such as red iron oxide or ultramarine blue- are considered ‘nature identical’ but not natural. I don’t have an issue with them, and if you wear makeup, you shouldn’t either. Mineral colors are what “Natural” makeup is made with.
- Micas—most are made with dyes, and many misbehave in cold-process soap. I avoid using them in soapmaking for that reason, but also because of child labor issues. Micas are also used in “Natural” make-up.
- LabColors—concentrated synthetic dyes
- FD&C and D&C colors—concentrated synthetic dyes
- Plant parts—leaf, stem, bark, seeds, flower, berries, and roots
- Animal extracts such as cochineal
Calculating How Much Water To Use
Another big question I get asked is why my recipes often use less water than soap calculators (using the default setting) or other recipes.
Water plays two main roles in a soap recipe. It dissolves the lye into a liquid solution that can evenly mix with the oils and start saponification. It can also speed up or slow down how long it takes your soap to reach ‘Trace’. The more water you use, the slower it will firm up. The less you use, the quicker it traces. Using more water in a soap recipe also helps the soap heat up and gel once it’s in the mold.
Default Soap Calculator Water Settings
By default, many soap calculators give you a water amount of 38% of the oil content. However, measuring water by the percentage of oil can be inaccurate. That’s because two 454g (1-lb) soap recipes can have different amounts of lye. Different oils need differing amounts of lye to change into soap.
One recipe calls for 60 g (2.1 oz) of lye, and another calls for 80 g (2.8 oz). If you measure the water based on the oil weight, the water amount will be the same for both recipes: 172.5 g (6.09 oz). This is calculated at 38% of 454 g (1 lb).
In the end, this means the first recipe will have a weaker lye solution (60 g lye + 172.5 g water) and will come to Trace more slowly. The other recipe (80 g lye + 172.5 g water) will have a stronger lye solution and may trace quicker.
Lye Solution Strengths
A better way to calculate the water amount in a soap recipe is to start with the lye amount. When creating lye solutions, the standard lye-to-water ratio is generally about 2:1. For example, 33 g of lye (1 part) and 67 g of water (2 parts). Lye concentration is another way of looking at it—it describes how strong the solution is. A 50% lye solution has equal parts water to lye and is extremely strong (the strongest you can make, in fact). A 25% solution contains 25% lye and 75% water, so it’s more diluted.
You’ve also probably come across a term called water discounting. Nearly all my soap recipes are water-discounted, meaning I use a stronger lye solution than usual. The benefits include a quicker trace time, shorter curing time, and no soda ash forming on my soap.
For single-color, simple soap recipes with a base made up of mainly coconut and olive oils, I use a 33.3 to 35.7% lye solution.
I hope this answers any questions you have about customizing a soap recipe. If you have any other general questions, please leave them in the comments below.
I have been making your non frozen goats milk recipe & would like some advise on if it is ok to double the recipe. I love the way it turns out whiter than the frozen goats milk soap
I also can’t find that video on your web site anymore. Have you deleted it. I just need an refresher view of the process
Hi Susie, it’s fine to double the recipe and thanks so much for the feedback :) The non-frozen goats milk recipe video is on YouTube.
Hello Tanya,
Please help me to understand more on LYE part.
You said in one place that we can multiply Lye amount by 3 to get water amount needed and on other you said multiply by 1.8 to get water amount.
What is the different between the two? Please help!!
Hi Asela, the amount of water used in a cold process soap recipe is variable. A good all-round amount is 2x the amount of lye by weight. My favorite amount is 1.8x though, since it helps speed up the time to trace and helps firm up the bars quicker in the mold. The SoapCalc by default gives water amounts for recipes based on hot-process soapmaking, though, not cold-process. So please ignore that amount and use 2x the amount of lye for the water amount in the beginner recipes that you’re making now.
Hi Tanya!
I congratulate you for the hard work that you are doing for us for sure..
If it pleases you; will you please record a video tutor of how to use a soapcalc? For me the written instruction in this calculator is really confusing🙈🙆.
And if possible kindly help me understand how to cure the tape water? Can I use EDTA? If yes in what amount?
Thank you for consideration 🙏
Hi Asela, I’ve just replied to your comments in the online soapmaking course. I recommend that you begin making the small batches that I share in the course and here on the website and get comfortable with making soap before considering making large batches. Walk before you run :) I’ll consider making a guide on how to use the SoapCalc, too!
Hi Tanya, I am going to make one of your basic recipes for starters. My father in love works in a local hive and he gave me some precious beeswax. I was wondering, if I add 1% to the recipe should I change any other value? Sorry, probably is a super dumb question but I had to try!
Hi Lau, in most cases I’d say to pop the full recipe into the SoapCalc and then make adjustments. If you’re adding just 1% of beeswax, though, then that’s fine! Also, only about half of beeswax can interact with lye and turn into soap and the other half stays in the soap adding hardness. That means that the recipe’s superfat would only increase by 0.5% if you added 1% beeswax to a recipe.
Hello Tanya. I want to make soap using olive oil and castor, what do you think about this combination? What ratio do you suggest? Can I reduce the amount of water like castile soap and use that formula? Thank you
Hi Ali, 95% olive oil and 5% castor oil would work but I wouldn’t recommend using any more castor oil than that. It’s a soft and sticky oil that can help stabilize lather but too much, especially in a soft oil soap recipe like this, can make the bars too soft.
i want to add aloe from my plant to a recipe, what do i need to change in order to do this, thank you
Hi there, you don’t need to change the recipe in itself; you just replace some or all of the water content with pureed and strained aloe vera.
Hello Tanya, I am new to soap making and have yet to make a batch. I have 60+ hours in intense study without practical experience. I love your blog and your soap recipes. I want to make several, but I am unfortunately very sensitive to coconut oil. I can tolerate some but the recipes have more then what is safe for me. How can I lower the coconut oil by half if possible, and raise the amounts of other fats/oils? It is so dis-heartening.
Thanks so much
Hi Christine, whenever you see coconut oil, you can substitute it directly for babassu oil. You will need to run the recipe through a soap calculator to get a new lye amount, though.
Hi Tania it’s Mariee, I would like to know if I can use tumeric, aloe or fenugreek powder into your recipe
Hi Marie and yes, you can. Powders like turmeric can be added around 1/2-1 tsp PPO (per 1-lb/454g batch of soap) and aloe vera gel can replace some of the water content in a soap recipe.
Hi Tanya,
I am new to soapmaking and find your lesson very valuable.
I have a question. I want to decorate my bar with a chocolate-like glaze with a semy glossy finish. What recipe would you recommend using? I can imagine using soap with a glycerin base but not as liquidy or transparent. Would I need to change the lye calculation if I just add glycerin to the hot process soap at the end of the process? Thank you.
The only way that I can think to get a glossy soap “glaze” is with melt and pour soap with a colorant.
Hi Tania,
Firstly, thank you for everything you do and share with us all. When you make a soap using a tea instead of water in the lye solution, would this be an ‘extract’ in the ingredient list? For instance, infusing lemon balm and mixing with lye. Can I say that the soap contains Melissa leaf extract?
Thank you :)
Hi Silvie, using your example, it’s my understanding (for the UK) that you could either say melissa officinalis or melissa officinalis leaf extract when labeling your soap.
I would like to add echuim seed oil to my recipe but that oil isnt listed on soapcalc ,echuim seed oil is 190 =205 sapofincation level i think palm oil is 190 to 205 but the the fatty acid characteristics of both oils are different .how do i add echuim oil accurately to ensure it saponify correctly in my soap recipe .id like to ensure that my soap not lye heavy ,as i dont know how to do it as echium oil and listed in soap calc
Echium seed oil is a quite pricey oil high in fatty acids and sold as a supplement or used in skincare. However, it’s an oil that you would use in products that stay on your skin, rather than wash off. I’ve never heard of anyone using it in soap before and there’s a good reason! That fine oil would be wasted in soap either during the saponfication process or if it does make it through that, then it would be washed down the drain as you clean. If you’d like to use it for the skin I’d recommend that you use it to make products like serums, moisturizers, and balms. You can use it in place of some of the liquid oil in this recipe and many others.
I’m interested in making Noni soaps,
But not too sure how
Can I replace water with the Noni juice?
Does this affect soaponification process
* I wanna use coconut milk as well in my recipes
Cold process do I also need to adjust the amount
if I replace water to coconut milk?
Hi Lessy, noni juice (juice from the fruit of the noni tree Morinda citrifolia) is well known to have volcano reactions with lye. Even if the juice is refrigerated. With noni juice, and other juices, it’s better to mix the lye with distilled water and allow to cool before adding the noni juice. That means that you could have half the water amount as distilled water and half as the juice.
Coconut milk would again be a replacement for the water amount. However, the best time to add it is at trace so you’d still mix the lye with some water at the start of the process.
Hi Tanya,
I’m interested in adding some natural colorants from your other article on the topic. I appreciate that you have described how to mix it in, but I’m not sure if I should subtract the liquid I am going to mix the powder into from the original recipe. For example, I’m considering adding spinach powder at trace. The place I bought it from recommends adding 2 tsp powder to 1 Tbsp light oil. Should I subtract that 1 Tbsp from the olive oil in the recipe? Based on this article I think that will increase my superfat a little but probably not much. Alternatively, I could add the powder to a little water and add at trace. Based on what you wrote here I think that wouldn’t affect the recipe much because the water evaporates.
How do you decide which to use (oil or water) when adding colorants at trace? And do you have to subtract it from the original amount in the recipe?
Thanks so much!
Hi Iris, there are many ways to add colorants into soap. If you use oil to pre-mix colorant, use it from the soap recipe rather than adding more in. If you use water, it’s fine to add a little extra. Some colorants mix better into oil or water and I make decisions based on that. Spinach will work with either :)
Hello sister .
Namaste I am trying to start making soap but I live in Nepal and olive oil is expensive here so is the coconut .Can i replace with sunflower oil?Currently we are having lockdown here so most of the items required are not available .I have lot more questions,can I have your facebook id please.
Hi Monika, you can find me on Facebook here. The point of this article is to explain that replacing an oil in a soap recipe is advanced and not as simple as you’d want. The entire recipe is impacted by the smallest change and you can make unsafe and/or poor quality soap if you don’t stick to the recipe. Sunflower oil is probably one of the worst oils that you can use on its own to make handmade soap. It will result in soft bars that spoil very quickly — they’ll get ‘dreaded orange spot’ and go rancid due to the fatty acid make-up of the oil. Though it’s not ideal due to ethical issues, palm oil might be one of your only choices for inexpensive soap in Nepal. I understand that it’s available as is mustard seed oil (not great for soap).
Hi, just reading how to adjust a recipe. If I adjust the oils being used I understand that, but If I want to use one of the recipes on your site but in bigger containers how do I adjust to make larger quantities.
If I say use a recipe from here that is say 454grams how do I adjust to 900grams.
Hi Lisa, you would do that by putting all of the figures into the SoapCalc. Then you adjust the batch size to 900 g, and it will work the new amounts out for you.
Hi Tanya,
I am really enjoying reading your articles and finding a lot of great information. I am new to soap making, so trying to learn as much as I can.
I am wondering if you have every used maple syrup in your soap recipes? Or how I would go about making a maple soap?
Thank you,
Charlene
Hi Charlene, and I’d recommend using maple syrup in the same way as honey. They’re both sugars and added to the lye solution it can caramelize and color/scent your soap or added after trace it can help boost lather. Here’s my recipe for honey and beeswax soap so that you can see how I use honey.
Just love your site!! Thank you for explaining so many soaping things in easy-to-understand terms. Question: When you speak of the fatty acids in this post, example: Lauric acid @ 15%… what does that % relate to? % of what? Because if I calculate it as a % of the oils, the numbers don’t make sense… example: if Lauric is 12, please explain what that “12” means in relation to “lauric acid at 15%”. I use SoapCalc and am trying to understand the profile of the fatty acids and how they relate to recipes. Thanks in advance.
Hi Lisa, Lauric acid is a fatty acid found in varying percentages in soapmaking oils. For example, coconut oil is made up of 48% lauric acid. To see this in the SoapCalc, create a recipe with only coconut oil listed. You can see its fatty acid profile to the left. However, some fatty acids such as lauric acid are also listed as ingredients — these are isolated fatty acids that are extracted from oils.
So to answer your question, the 15% lauric acid refers to the recommended maximum amount of all the lauric acid in the recipe. It accounts for the lauric acid found in soapmaking oils such as coconut oil, and for the lauric acid that may be added in as an ingredient. If you see 12 as a figure in your fatty acid profile, that means that the recipe has 12% lauric acid.
I’m a new soaper. I’ve made many of your recipes and they all turn out great! But I am trying to go further and understand more fully the term “water discounting” and where to enter that into Soap Calc. I guess I must have a mental block even though I’ve read your info and numerous sites over and over. When your recipe (or any recipes) says “x-% water discount”, where do I enter that into SoapCalc? Is “Water Discount” synonymous with “Lye Concentration”? If I enter your recipe into Soap Calc in the Lye Concentration field, the results are exactly as your recipe indicates. So, do I understand that “Water Discount” and “Lye Concentration” are the same?
They are two terms that refer to the same thing — using less water to create a stronger lye-solution. Water discounting refers to the process of using less water, and lye concentration refers to the final result. The terms can be used interchangeably.
Hello,
I tried your lavender soap recipe about 5 months ago and it turned out beautifully. I trust your recipes as it is obvious you understand the chemistry and have also tested extensively. I’m wondering if I can simply double or triple your original recipe (no substations) or should I run the ingredients through the soap calc to batch up?
Thanks
I’m in the process of converting all of my soap recipes into printable pieces that can also double or triple the recipe. I’ve not got to that one yet, though :) To answer your question, yes you can scale the recipe up if you wish. Run it through the SoapCalc if you have any worries though.
Hello tanya, I have a very rough skin. Nothing I use is working, .please can you help me out.
Hi Tanya in all the tutorials I’ve watched and articles I’ve read none of them explains so vividly why soap recipes cannot be changed just like that the way yours did. Your article mastered the touch of answering my every question.I’m an excellent baker and have been quite successful with alot of my recipes from adding my own touch or taking away and replacing and was a little disheartened by the fact that this doesn’t work in my newly found passion. However, this little mole hill in my pathway will not dampen my passion to master the art of soaping. I’ll continue to stick to your recipes because I like yours best for now till I master the soap calc. Let me mention because of you I’m now collecting my own herbs and spices and infusing oils to make my own handmade soaps. You inspire me and made me realize I was not enjoying my life because I wasn’t doing the things I love on a daily basis such as gardening , soaping and collecting all sorts of spices and dried flowers and herbs. Looking forward to reading more of your articles and trying out more of your recipes.
Thanks for the lovely feedback Alisha and don’t worry, with time and experience, you’ll be able to customize your own soap too :)
HELLO, have you used nanogold oraz nanosilver in your soaps. How much of it should be added to simple basic soaps recipe? I would appreciate your suggestion very much.
I’ve not used it but don’t think that it’s an approved ingredient for soapmaking, in any case.
I’m new to soap making and have been using one of your soap recipes that is easy to follow and has simple ingredients. I’m finding it very smooth and hydrating which I love! but it makes small creamy bubbles rather than big lathered bubbles, which is what I would like. I’m wondering if I can adjust the ratio of coconut oil and olive oil by adding more coconut oil and less olive? I get confused about potentially having to adjust the lye amount if I change any of the oil amounts. The recipe I am using of yours is this one:
110 g Sodium hydroxide
220 g Distilled water
200 g Coconut oil (refined)
80 g Shea butter
480 g Olive pomace oil
40 g Castor oil
Please help! Thank you for all of your soap making info and recipes :)
Hi Courtney, I don’t give individual advice on how to change individual soap recipes, but have a piece that gives more info! Also, if you want big fluffy bubbles, use soap that’s cured for at least six weeks and choose recipes that use around 25% coconut oil or babassu oil. Adding sugar to soap recipes can increase the lather too! Use 1 tsp white sugar per 1lb (454 g) oil in a soap recipe. Dissolve in a TBSP of warmed distilled water and add at trace. A tsp of honey at trace can help with more bubbles too. Good luck :)
Hi Tanya,
thank you so much for taking the time to write this article out so concisely. I am new to soap making, and have just made my first batch of castile soap using your instructions (I am happy and impressed that it came to trace super nicely). I like castile soap because it’s super simple and uses only olive oil. I was then looking at some of your other recipes, thinking it would be nice to try more but do I really want to buy multiple different oils and fats, and can’t I just substitute all for olive oil… well, you’ve excellently answered why that is Not a good idea, as I suspected.
Hi Maria, what you could do is use my castile soap recipe and customize with the optional ingredients. Meaning, make the recipe as explained but then add different essential oils, colors, or flowers as described in other 1-lb soap recipes. Add these as described in the second recipe but stick to temperatures and base soap ingredients with the castile soap recipe. Hope that makes sense? https://lovelygreens.com/simple-castile-soap-recipe-make-olive-oil-soap/
This article is so helpful. Someone above was talking about superfat/discount. Say I am going to do a soap and put 7% superfat/discount. Are you saying that I measure out 7% of oil a put it aside till after it has come to trace then mix it in? How do you decide which oil? Also any recipe that has a % of superfat I do the same?
If you want a specific oil to stay free floating in your bars, add that oil to the soap batter after Trace. Otherwise, you don’t have to add it at that point — just mix all the oils together with the lye-solution. The end result of that would be bars that still have a superfat, but it’s made up of all of the oils you’ve used in your recipe.
Hello how are you?! On this question of superfat, so, if I want to leave the percentage of floating oils in the trace, should I leave it at 0% superfat in the calculator?
Floating oils?
Hi Tanya
I will just order my equipment for cold process soap,and will be starting with few recipe ,but I am still trying to understand everything about soap cal I find it very complicated
I wish you will make this video ., if not I would like you to visit Curacao to teach me .
Dear Tanya,
First of all, thank you so much for sharing this on your beautiful website.
I have a question regarding the use of the soapcalc, maybe you can give some insight.
If I would make a batch with an super fat of 10% (of almond oil or grape seed oil), is it a good idea to use the soapcalculator entering all my other oils and fill in 0%overfat, and adding 10% of my oil weight extra as super fat after the trace. Because the amount of lye-NaOH is depending on the types of oil you use. But in the calculator isn’t a subdivision incorporated for which oils you add after the trace stadium.
If I do it this way, I probably won’t be able to use the quality ranges as relevant for that batch?
Sorry if my question is complicated, but I can’t get my head around it.
Kind regards,
Charlie
Hi Charlie — the soap calc can be difficult to learn to use so don’t worry. First of all, be aware that a soap with a 10% superfat will probably come out of the mold soft and sticky. Depending on the oils, it may harden up with time.
The superfat calculated takes into consideration the average of all the oils used. However, it’s perfectly fine to use in your calculations even if you just want one oil to be the superfat. Calculate your recipe using the soap calc and then assemble your ingredients. Measure out 10% of your oil quantity that you want as the superfat and stir it in after Trace.
Hi,
I love receiving all the information you share. I do have a concern with the SoapCalc app, it’s not a secure site. Any recommendations?
Thanks
As long as you’re not giving it personal information it’s ok to use.
Hi Tanya,
Great lengthy article! I love reading all your soaping blogposts because through you I’ve become a soap maker myself. I knew a lot already, but the part about lye concentrations was new and I learned a lot from that!
Also, I think you made a typo in the fragrance part: “It’s in g/kg so 30g would be 30% of 1kg.” That should be 3%.
Keep up the great work :)
Love,
Charlotte
Thank you for pointing that out Charlotte! Pesky zero removed :)
Thank you for sharing your knowledge, some of it I understood but some are a bit hard for me since i’m a visual learner :) Can you maybe make a video about the lye to water percentage
( concentration ) and the water recommendation.
Thanks again :)
Thank you for all your great information. I really appreciate that you explained the water discount.
If I add clay, should I reserve water from the lye to mix with the clay? I was thinking of adding a white clay to lighten soap made with organic olive oil and then adding alkanet root.
I’m tyring to accomplish pink and purple colors while using organic olive oil.
Organic olive oil tends to be a greenish-yellow in color and that translates to the soap too. I’m afraid it’s not as simple as adding clay and alkanet to balance it out. It’s not like painting a wall with layers of paint but rather like mixing the paint itself. The end color would be a mix of all three.
Pomace olive oil is lighter in color which is one reason it’s more popular with soap makers.
To answer your question about mixing clay: it’s better to not water discount when adding clay to a recipe since it can cause your soap to crack. Use a full water amount and mix your clay in with the lye or with water reserved from the water part. It’s your choice.
Fabulously thorough article! Thank you a million times over!! I’ve just gotten the SoapCalc. You’ve also included so much extra incredibly valuable info. I’m bookmarking this as I know I’ll refer to it again and again. Thanks!
You’re very welcome Quigley and happy soaping :)