Tag Archives: citric acid

Happy Holly Balls – Bath Bombs with Holly Port of Lotion Bar Cafe

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Holly Port of Lotion Bar Café is the Bath Bomb Queen! If you were at the HSMG conference, the Alabama conference or the Texas conference you were lucky enough to get one of her bath bombs. She was visiting this weekend and I asked her if she would be willing to do a bath bomb tutorial for the blog. I told her I wanted something with goat’s milk and oatmeal so she came up with a specially formulated recipe that I could share with you! She also shared her process which includes some very helpful information and techniques.

These bath bombs have my favorite butter, mango, and my favorite oil, avocado! I got in a new fragrance from Bramble Berry (Fresh Snow) that smells amazing so I wanted to try that out.

The Recipe:
2.5 cups baking soda
.5 cups goat milk powder
1.5 cups citric acid
1 cup cornstarch
.5 cups powder oatmeal
1.6 oz avocado oil (wt)
2 oz mango buter (wt)
.5 oz water (wt)
.5 oz alcohol (wt)
.75 oz scent (wt)

Step 1 – Measure the citric acid, cornstarch, baking soda, oatmeal and goat’s milk into your mixing bowl. Put a towel over your mixer and turn on the lowest setting. The towel prevents the powders from flying everywhere! Although you don’t have to use a stand mixer…it helps to get everything mixed well and also aerate the mixture. Leave this mixing while you measure out the butter and liquid ingredients.

Step 2 – Measure out the butter and oil. Melt.

Step 3 – While the butter is melting, measure out the other liquid ingredients (alcohol, water, fragrance).

Step 4 – When the melted oil has cooled down a bit (warm to touch – not hot) combine with the liquid ingredients.

Step 5 – With the mixer still on low, dump in the liquid mix. Turn the mixer up higher to get everything mixed quickly. Scrape the sides of the mixing bowl with a skewer as the butter might stick a bit to the sides.

Step 6 – Test the mixture’s consistency by grabbing a handful and squeezing it hard. It should keep its shape and not fall apart easily.

Step 7 – Using a meatballer, scoop up some of the mixture. Squeeze the meatballer hard with your hand while smoothing the seam.

Step 8 – Using your thumb, press down on the hole on the top of the meatballer as you open it. This helps the bathbomb stay together as the meatballer opens. It takes some practice! If the bathbomb falls apart just dump it back into the mix and try again.

Step 9 – Let your bathbombs dry out in a cool dry place away from humidity and heat.

We dusted them with a bit of glitter just to add a holiday sparkle!

To use your bathbomb, simply drop it into the tub and watch it fizz!

Warning: This recipe does contain butters/oils. They will float on the surface of the water and deposit on your body as you soak in the tub and as you get out of the water. It will leave some in the tub and make it a bit slick so take care when getting out of the tub.

Thank you so much for doing this tutorial for us and sharing some of your tips, Holly!

If you are looking for wholesale bathbombs to add to your line of products…contact Holly!

Happy Soaping!  (Or bath bomb making!)

-Amanda & Holly

Neutralizing and superfating liquid soap

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Neutralizing your soap

If you want to be truly successful making and formulating liquid soap you really need to consider purchasing a digital PH meter. I bought one from a fish supply store and it cost $80.00. You might find one cheaper on Ebay or Craig’s List but I highly recommend getting one. You really can’t successfully and accurately neutralize your liquid soap if you can’t accurately determine the PH.

I like my liquid soap to be between 8.7 and 9.7. I shoot for 9. There are several factors that will determine your resulting PH including oils used, lye excess amount, water evaporation during the cooking and water added for dilution. So even though you use the same recipe each time; it’s still helpful to meter each batch so you know exactly where you are at.

Just for example…Dr Bronner’s soap meters at about 8.5. They use citric acid in theirs. If you get a meter, take the time to test liquid soap you might run across. Real liquid soap not syndets!

I’m going to discuss two neutralizers because they are the only two I’ve used. I have not used boric acid but I understand that is similar to using citric acid as far as amounts go. But I have not used it.

Borax – Borax is actually more of a buffer and not really a “neutralizer”. It brings down the PH of liquid soap because it has a lower PH itself. Borax is also great because it helps thicken your soap, it softens hard water and helps prevent congealing (that layer of soap on top).

Even though borax is magical in liquid soap there is some controversy in using it. Some people claim it is not good to use on broken skin, children under three or sensitive skin as it can be an irritant. You’ll just need to do your research and find out if you want to use it. I have a couple of different types of liquid soap I make. One of them is thicker and uses borax and the other is a bit thinner and uses citric acid.

Citric Acid – Citric acid is a great neutralizer and easy to use. I haven’t heard of it being an irritant like borax.

You’ll need to determine the resulting PH of your soap. For this recipe using an 8% lye excess I usually meter around 9.5-9.7 PH. Heat your soap back up.

To buffer using a borax solution –
Even though I do a 8% lye excess instead of Failor’s 10%, I follow Failor’s recommendations for using borax. I make a 33% solution of borax/water and add 3/4 oz per pound of paste to my diluted soap. So I’ll boil 9 oz of water and add 3 oz of borax. You have to boil it while dissolving…it’s a sucker to get dissolved at times. It will turn to clear when ready. Since we ended up with 55 ounces of paste I’m going to add about 2.5 ounces (by weight) of this solution. Test your PH. If you want to drop it a bit more, you can add another .25-.5 ounce of the solution. If you add too much your soap will cloud up a bit. Now you can add your superfat ingredients.

To drop the PH using citric acid -
I use about 5 grams citric acid per 50 oz of paste. I weigh the citric acid in a Pyrex measuring cup and pour about 1-2 ounces of boiling water over it to dissolve. Add this to your warm soap mixture. When you add it, your mixture will look like egg drop soup. This is the result of the citric acid turning the soap it touches back into free oils. I then add my superfat ingredients and let sit over night. By the next morning the curdled soap has mixed back in and all is well. If it hasn’t… gently heat, stir and let it sit for a couple more hours. Test the PH. With this recipe it drops by about .3. So if I started at 9.5 it results in a PH of 9.2. If your soap started at a 9.7 then dissolve 10 grams and add that.

You’ll really just have to experiment and keep testing the PH. I’m happy with a 9.2.

You don’t want to add too much of the citric acid or your oils/fats will start separating out and you’ll end up with an absolute mess!

Superfating your soap

Once you’ve neutralized your soap you can stop there…or you might choose to add some superfat ingredients. There are two that I use:

Sulfated Castor Oil – Also known as Turkey Red Oil, Sulfated Castor oil is water soluble. If you were to add olive or avocado oil to your liquid soap it would simply float at the top. Sulfated Castor oil will mix into your liquid soap. I add it at 1% of diluted soap.

The only problem is that some people are allergic to sulfated products so they can’t use it. I use it in my main recipe along with borax and use only glycerin in my other recipe that I use citric acid in.

Glycerin – Glycerin makes a great superfat for liquid soap. It is a solvent (adds clarity) and provided emollient properties to your finished product. I add it at 1% of diluted soap.

For this recipe, let’s use 1% of each for our superfat.

We’ll discuss storing, fragrance, color and packaging next.

Amanda