Salt Soap Tutorial by Ladybug Soapworks

Sarah, of Ladybug Soapworks generously created a salt soap tutorial after I ungracefully begged her. Since my begging, I have made my own salt bars with some success (at least this is my belief before I've tried them).

Salt Bar Tutorial
By Sarah Marie Auclair
Ladybug Soapworks

Note: These instructions are written for someone who has experience making soap and knows the potential dangers due to working with sodium hydroxide.

1. A sample recipe would have 80% coconut oil and 20% liquid oils. I like to use Avocado oil and castor oil as my liquid oil components. You can play around with proportions, but generally coconut oil should be kept above 50%. You should make sure to superfat between 15-20% to ensure that the coconut does not cause the bar to become too drying. I also like to have a 20% water discount. The following is a sample recipe for you to try out.

12.8oz Coconut oil
2.4oz Avocado oil
0.8oz Castor oil

4.82oz Water (reflects a 20% discount)
2.43oz Sodium Hydroxide (reflects a 15% discount)

16oz Sea Salt

2. As with all soap making, you must have all of your equipment and ingredients fully prepared before you start since the reaction moves quickly.

a. Equipment:

• Scale
• Protective gear: gloves, goggles, face mask
• 2 medium plastic containers (32oz yogurt containers work great as do 32oz paint mixing containers. Alternatively, a glass Pyrex measuring cup works as well)
• 1 large plastic container
• Stick blender
• Stainless steel or silicone spoon or spatula
• Bowls to weigh out salt, fragrance, and colorant
• Mold (I like wooden log/loaf molds) make sure it is lined and ready to go before you start making the soap.

b. Ingredients:

• Coconut oil (76°F)
• Liquid oils of choice
• Fragrance or Essential oil (optional)
• Colorant (optional)
• Sea salt (medium or fine grain)

c. Put on your protective gear. This is very important since you will be working with an extremely caustic base that can and will burn you if you touch it. Noxious fumes are also released from the exothermic reaction that occurs when you mix the sodium hydroxide with water. Wear a face mask or leave the vicinity quickly after stirring the sodium hydroxide into the water. If you get any lye on your skin just wash it off quickly with copious amounts of cool water.

d. Preheat your kitchen oven to its lowest temperature (approximately 170°F).

e. Weigh out the water first. Next weigh out the sodium hydroxide. Add the sodium hydroxide to the water and mix quickly with your spoon or spatula. Leave this solution to cool for about 1 hour. I do not worry so much about temperatures, but I like to have both my lye solution and oils cool enough that I can touch the bottom of the containers they are in without it being too hot to hold my hand there for some time. As you can see in the picture below, I use a stir bar and stir plate to mix my sodium hydroxide solution. However, if you do not have access to such things, a spoon or spatula will work just fine.

f. While the lye is cooling, weigh out your oils, fragrance, colorant, and salt. Mix your colorant into the fragrance if the color is a powder or if it is liquid you can mix it into your salts.

g. Melt your oils in a microwave heating in increments of 30 seconds until the all the coconut oil is just melted. You do not want it to get too hot. Again check to make sure you can touch the bottom of the oil container without it being too hot to hold your hand there.

3. Once both the lye and oils have cooled sufficiently you can add the lye solution to your oils.

4. Begin to stick blend for about 30 seconds or so and then stir with the stick blender. This helps to keep the motor in the stick blender from burning out. Keep the stick blender fully submerged to decrease the amount of air that gets mixed in and reduce the number of bubbles formed.

5. You will see the mixture start to thicken and turn more of a creamy opaque color after a couple of minutes. Once the mixture is at a light trace add your fragrance and coloring. Trace is characterized by lines or drops remaining on the surface of the soap when you remove the stick blender.

6. Continue to stick blend until you reach a medium-thick trace.

7. After mixing in all the colorant, mix in the sea salt. I use a 1:1 ratio of sea salt to oils. You can use slightly more of less depending on your preferences. Do not use Dead Sea salt as the extra minerals seem to cause undesirable excess sweating of the bars.

8. Pour your soap in a lined mold. I use parchment paper with my wooden mold.

9. Cover the top of the soap with a layer of plastic wrap to help prevent ash.

10. Place the mold into your preheated oven and turn off the oven. Leave the soap in the oven for about 2 hours or until the soap feels firm enough to cut. Cut the soap immediately after you take it out of the oven or else it will become too hard to cut.

Below are salt soaps that Sarah made:

jasmine salt soap bar

chocolate covered nuts salt bar

You can also check out her blog here!