Goat milk, oat and honey bar
A creamy, gentle bar with goat milk in place of all the water, a spoonful of honey for lather and colloidal oats for a soft feel. Palm-free, unscented, and kept cool so it stays pale.
- Skill
- Intermediate
- Method
- Cold process
- Batch
- 1000 g of oils about 1508 g of batter
- Hands-on
- 1 hour
- Cure
- 6 weeks
- Gel phase
- No keep it cool
What you need
For 1000 g of oils, which fills a 1.5 litre loaf mould. Weigh everything, liquids included.
| Olive Oil · 45.0 % | 450 g | 15.87 oz |
| Coconut Oil · 25.0 % | 250 g | 8.82 oz |
| Shea Butter · 20.0 % | 200 g | 7.05 oz |
| Cocoa Butter · 5.0 % | 50 g | 1.76 oz |
| Castor Oil · 5.0 % | 50 g | 1.76 oz |
| Sodium hydroxide (NaOH) · the lye, 100 % pure | 138.7 g | 4.89 oz |
| Goat milk, frozen in cubes · all of the liquid; the lye goes onto it | 315 g | 11.11 oz |
| Honey · 2 tbsp, warmed and stirred into 1 tbsp of the oils | 42 g | 1.48 oz |
| Colloidal oatmeal · 2 tbsp, at light trace | 12.1 g | 0.43 oz |
- Superfat
- 5 %
- Temperatures
- Keep the milk and lye below 30 °C (86 °F) and soap at about 30 °C (86 °F)
Method
-
Freeze the milk
Weigh the goat milk into an ice-cube tray the day before and freeze it solid. -
Get ready
Put on goggles, gloves and long sleeves, work where the air moves, weigh every ingredient, and line or prepare the mould. -
Melt the solid oils
Melt the coconut oil, shea butter and cocoa butter gently, then stir in the olive and castor oils and let them cool to about 30 °C (86 °F). -
Add the lye to the milk
Stand the jug of frozen milk in a bowl of iced water and sprinkle the lye in a spoonful at a time, never the milk onto the lye, stirring until each dissolves; it takes 10 to 15 minutes, and the milk should stay pale yellow and below 30 °C (86 °F). -
Combine
Pour the milk-lye solution into the oils through a sieve and stick blend in short bursts, stirring between them, until the batter reaches light trace. -
Add the honey and oats
Stir the honey into a tablespoon of the warm oils so it loosens, then blend it and the colloidal oatmeal into the batter. -
Pour
Pour into the mould, tap it on the bench to release air, and smooth the top. -
Keep it cool
Leave the mould uncovered in a cool room, or in the fridge for the first day, so the milk and honey do not overheat it into gel. -
Unmould and cut
After 36 to 48 hours, when the loaf is firm, unmould it with gloves on and cut it into bars. -
Cure
Stand the bars on a rack with air between them for six weeks, turning them now and then.
Tips
- A little tan colour is normal: milk sugars and honey darken slightly in lye. Orange or brown means it got too hot.
- If the milk turns thick and custard-like while you add the lye, it is too cold; let it warm a few degrees and keep going.
- Honey speeds trace and heats the batch, so have the mould ready before you add it.
The oils
| Oil | Share |
|---|---|
| Olive Oil (virgin / refined / olive oil) | 45.0 % |
| Coconut Oil | 25.0 % |
| Shea Butter | 20.0 % |
| Cocoa Butter (Theobroma Oil) | 5.0 % |
| Castor Oil | 5.0 % |
How it is made
| Process | Cold process |
| Alkali | NaOH |
| Superfat | 5 % |
| Water | lye water at 33 % |
| Iodine value | 57 |
| INS | 148 |
Why make it
The classic gentle bar: goat milk for all the liquid, honey for a livelier lather and colloidal oatmeal for a soft feel, unscented and palm-free. On our scale it cleanses at 17 with conditioning 57, a mild everyday bar, and the milk's own fat nudges the superfat to about 6 %. Makers have long chosen goat milk soap for dry skin (Makela), a reputation built on experience rather than trials. Colloidal oatmeal is different: the US Food and Drug Administration recognises it as a skin protectant in products that stay on the skin, but in soap the contact is brief and rinsed away, so do not expect the same. Being unscented, it also fits the dermatologists' advice to use a fragrance-free cleanser on dry skin. The price is care: the milk must stay cool.
Sources
- Making Natural Milk Soap (excerpted from Milk-Based Soaps) · Storey Publishing, 1999
- OTC Monograph M016: Skin protectant drug products for over-the-counter human use · U.S. Food and Drug Administration, 2021
- Dermatologists' top tips for relieving dry skin · American Academy of Dermatology
What tradition, makers' experience and research say about soaps like this, each labelled for what it is. It is not medical advice, and no soap treats a skin condition: if you have one, ask a doctor or pharmacist.
What the numbers say
- Lauric acid 12.3 %
- Myristic acid 4.7 %
- Palmitic acid 10.5 %
- Stearic acid 12.2 %
- Ricinoleic acid 4.4 %
- Oleic acid 44.3 %
- Linoleic acid 7.6 %
- Other 5.0 %
Saturated : unsaturated 43 : 57
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.
From the guides
All guides
Milk soap: goat milk, freezing and keeping it pale
How to make goat milk soap without scorching it: frozen milk, lye added a spoonful at a time, a cool mould, and a full recipe worked through the calculator.
Gel phase: to insulate or keep it cool
What gel phase is, why a loaf turns dark and translucent, how gelled and ungelled bars differ, why partial gel is cosmetic, and how to cause or prevent it.
Soap additives: salt, sugar, sodium lactate, clays, oats, silk and more
What common soap additives do, how much to use and when they go in: sourced doses for sodium lactate, salt, sugar, honey, citric acid, clays, oats and silk.
Guides with this recipe
Where these proportions come from
A palm-free everyday bar with goat milk as the whole liquid, the method milk-soap makers have used since the 1990s: frozen milk, lye added slowly, the batch kept cool so the milk sugars do not scorch.
Formulation adapted from Making Natural Milk Soap (excerpted from Milk-Based Soaps) by Casey Makela (Storey Publishing, 1999). The method and notes are ours.