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Cold Process Beer Soap Recipe
Prep for beer:
For your beer soap to work well you firstly need to remove the alcohol and carbonation (fizz) from it by boiling the beer for about 15 minutes keeping a close eye on it ensuring it doesn’t boil over. *If you do not boil the beer and remove the alcohol it can react badly when you begin to make the lye causing a bubbling mess so make sure you are wearing rubber gloves and all your safety gear! After you have boiled the beer leave it uncovered in the fridge over night to ensure all the carbonation and alcohol has been removed. Take it out about an hour before you intend to use it in your soap. Note:- When you boil your beer you will lose up to half so make sure you have enough to start with. We used two 500ml bottle of beer to be sure we had enough.
Ingredients:
• 50g Avocado Oil
• 248g Rapeseed Oil
• 248g Coconut Oil
• 198g Palm Oil
• 248g Olive Oil
• 131g Sodium Hydroxide (pearls)
• 370g Dark beer or ale of your choice (final prepped weight)
Optional Extra’s:
• 20ml (more colour can be added if necessary) White Titanium Dioxide Dispersion
• 20 ml Essential or Fragrance oils (ensure any fragrance oil is compatible with CP soap) for this recipe we are using Sweet Orange and Cedarwood Atlas ¼ tsp of Grapefruit Seed Extract (optional) 4tsp of Cinnamon (ground).
Equipment
•Scales (1g increments)
•Jugs (heat resistant plastic or Pyrex) Whisk (hand whisk)
•Stainless Steel Pans
•Measuring Spoons
•Goggles or Safety Glasses
•Rubber Gloves
•1kg Mould & Baking Sheet to line your mould (folded, not cut)
Instructions to make Beer Soap
Step 1
Firstly you need to prep your beer as instructed. Once beer is prepared then you can begin making your beer soap. Get your mould lined and ready and weigh out your ingredients that you will need.
Step 2
To make your lye add a little sodium hydroxide at a time to the beer and stir before adding more. It will be a bit more difficult to see if the sodium hydroxide has dissolved in the dark colour of the beer so just take extra care mixing to avoid any chunks floating in your beer before adding to your oils. Make sure you are wearing the appropriate clothing and equipment before mixing. Put your lye to one side to cool slightly whilst making up the remaining ingredients. You can speed the cooling process if you wish by placing your jug of lye in a large bowl containing a shallow amount of cold water (If you do this be careful it doesn’t float).
Step 3
Fully melt your Coconut and Palm oils and then add to your soap making pan then add your Avocado, Rapeseed Oil and Olive Oil and stir altogether. You can add Grapefruit seed extract here if you want to speed up the trace and to act as a natural antioxidant. Once oils are all mixed slowly and careful add your lye/beer mixture and start to whisk straight away and continuing until you see a light trace.
Step 4
When you see a light trace you can add the essential oils (or fragrance oils) of your choice (ensure any fragrance will work in cold process soaps). For this recipe we chose to do both a fragranced soap and a coloured soap so you can pick which one you fancy making.
Step 5
For the orange and cedar soap: measure out your essential oils, we did 10ml of Sweet orange oil and 10ml of Cedar wood atlas to the mixture For the cinnamon coloured and textured soap: Using a bit of olive oil mix in the cinnamon powder to the oil to make a paste like mixture. Use this later to naturally colour and fragrance your soap. We chose to use cinnamon as we wanted a deep brown colour to the bottom of our soap to make it as realistic as possible to a nice thick ale or beer, plus it gives the soap a nice texture and feel.
Step 6
Once the essentials oils or colour has been added whisk your mixture until you have found its full trace (this usually looks like a hair is sat on the top of the surface when you drizzle some of the mixture back into the pan from your whisk). There’s no need to colour this mixture as the beer/ale will give it a nice natural brown colour.
Step 7
For our beer soap we poured ¾’s of our mixture into the soap mould then continued to colour the other ¼ with a white titanium dioxide suspension. We then gently whisked this mixture slowly whilst the other ¾ of the loaf gelled slightly in the mould. This allows us time to pour the rest of the mixture on top and create a nice fun layered effect like an actual beer with a head.
Step 8
Once you are happy with your soap and its overall look cover with a lid and wrap with towels to keep in the warmth and avoid your soap cooling too quickly. If it cools to quickly it will go chalky and white around the edges. So the better you wrap it nice and snuggly the better your beer soap will set.
Step 9
Leave overnight to set, once set cut into slices and cure for 3 weeks at room temperature. If you have an airing cupboard or a warm room in your house that will work best.
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