Rebatching!

I rebatched batch #4 in the earlier "ew" post.  That was some gross soap, although it smelled good and had a pretty color!  I grated it and threw it in the crockpot:

 

 

I read a website that recommended milk while the rebatch was melting, and then dry milk as the "secret ingredient" when stirring just before glopping it into the mold.  The secret ingredient didn't do much, IMO, but I gave it a shot :)  Behold the ugly glop!

 

 

I didn't insulate it since it had cooked in the crockpot.  I just left it in the (cool) oven overnight where the cats wouldn't bother it.

 

When it came out of the mold 24 hours later, it was extremely soft.  I think the extra milk and/or dry milk made it that way.  It was so soft that when I put it on a wire shelf, it glopped down onto the next shelf!  We remolded it into bar-like shapes, and it's finally firming up after a few days of curing time.

 

So I'm writing that batch off as a bad job; we'll just use it for our own bathing purposes.

 

I did another batch last night to try out the oils that I got from Soaper's Choice.  I decided to try soaping at room temperature; instead of using thermometers to keep lye and oils at the same temp, I just poured the lye into the room temperature oils.  It worked great!  I finally feel like my soap looks somewhat like the shiny glossy soaps that I see on YouTube:

 

 

Coconut Oil (76 degree) - 8 oz

Palm oil - 12 oz

Rice Bran Oil - 12 oz

Tallow - 12 oz

Water (33%) - 14.52 oz

Lye (5% superfat) - 6.09 oz

1 oz China Rain FO from Symphony Scents

1 oz Green Tea FO from Symphony Scents

1 oz green mica from 2 different Etsy sellers, different shades.

 

I think it turned out really nicely, except that I tried doing a Celene Swirl again and it just has the darker green blob in the middle:

 

 

Still, I saw the texturing technique on YouTube and I tried it and think it came out pretty.  The fragrance is a little light but you can still smell it.  All in all, a success!