Carrot Juice Soap

At the beginning of February, I shared a picture of a large carrot with you. I asked if I should make a soap with the carrot. Your responses helped me decide that I would make a soap with carrot juice.

I wanted to make sure that my soap succeeded, so I chose to make the soap using the half and half method. The half and half method is called this because of all your liquids, you use half water, half alternative liquid, and add the alternative liquid half way through the blending of the batch.

Let’s go make some soap!

Collect needed items:

Ingredients
Palm Kernel Oil
Coconut Oil
Olive Oil
Shea Butter, Refined
Water
Carrot Juice from carrots and water
Sodium Hydroxide

Equipment
Scale
Soap Spoon
Gloves
Mold of your choice (I’m using an empty milk carton, quart sized.)
Immersion Blender

Recipe:

Recipe in ounces:
6 ounces Palm Kernel Oil
5 ounces Coconut Oil
4 ounces Olive Oil
1 ounces Shea Butter, Refined
3 ounces Water
3 ounces Carrot Juice
2.45 ounces Sodium Hydroxide (6% Superfat)

Recipe in grams:
169.9 grams Palm Kernel Oil
141.6 grams Coconut Oil
113.2 grams Olive Oil
28.3 grams Shea Butter, Refined
85 grams Water
85 grams Carrot Juice
69.4 grams Sodium Hydroxide (6% Superfat)

Recipe in Percentages
37.5% Palm Kernel Oil
31.25% Coconut Oil
25% Olive Oil
6.25% Shea Butter, Refined
q.s. Water
q.s. Carrot Juice
q.s. Sodium Hydroxide (6% Superfat)

*q.s. = Quantity Sufficient. This is an ingredient that needs to have the amount calculated to match the size of batch that you are making.

Making Carrot Juice:
I made the carrot juice by chopping the carrot into small chunks and placing the chunks in a blender. I then added approximately 1/4 cup of hot water and turned on the blender. Unfortunately, I learned that the blender I was using doesn’t turn raw carrots and water into carrot juice. 😐 It took nearly 15 minutes to get 6 ounces of carrot juice! Next time I make carrot juice with a similar blender, I will steam or boil the carrots first and then mix with water in a blender to make carrot juice. (Or use a high quality, high efficiency blender!)

Making Soap:
Measure fixed oils on your scale. Warm the fixed oils on the stove or in the microwave. I melted the oils on the stove in a double boiler. Add sodium hydroxide to the water. Mix well. Combine oils and lye solution. Mix until thin trace. Add carrot juice. Pour soap into the desired mold. Allow to sit until soap is firm. The next morning cut into bars. Stack to allow good air circulation. Allow to cure for several days before using. Longer curing will result in a harder bar.

Soap Notes: This soap had a light, clean, and sweet “soapy” scent that was around even after sitting around for a week. The soap color did change to a greenish color, but I still think the soap is very pretty! The soap had a wonderful lather that was a mixture of big and small bubbles that I made just with my hands. I loved the feeling that the soap left on my skin after washing. I tried this soap on my hands, body and face with no problems! I think I’ll make another batch of soap as a gift for my mother-in-law for her birthday!

What do you think? Would you try this soap?