The oils
| Oil | Share |
|---|---|
| Palm Kernel Oil | 45.0 % |
| Coconut Oil | 25.0 % |
| Shea Butter | 30.0 % |
How it is made
| Process | Cold process |
| Alkali | KOH |
| Superfat | 6 % |
| Water | 90 % of the oils |
| Iodine value | 26 |
| INS | 201 |
What the numbers say
Hardness 68 above 29–54
Cleansing 47 above 12–22
Conditioning 26 below 44–69
Bubbly lather 47 above 14–46
Creamy lather 21 16–48
Computed from the fatty acids of the fats above. The bands are what the craft has settled on, not chemistry — a bar outside one is not wrong.
Try it differently
5 variationsThe same soap with one thing moved. Each opens in the calculator ready to change again.
Where these proportions come from
The traditional article gets its colour and its alkali from the same ash. Nothing here reproduces that.
West African black soap is traditionally made with potash from roasted cocoa pod and plantain skin ash, and palm kernel oil and shea. This is the cold-process reading of those fats, not the ash process.
A canonical formulation: the proportions the craft has settled on for this kind of soap. Not transcribed from a document, and not copied from anywhere.