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Gentler bars

Low-cleansing bar

Plain pale cream soap bars with smooth tops beside a dish of shea butter and a small glass jug of golden olive oil on a soft green backdrop

A gentle everyday bar with only 10 % coconut oil, so it cleans lightly and leaves skin less dry than a standard bar. Olive oil, shea butter and rice bran oil at an 8 % superfat, a little sodium lactate to help it out of the mould, and no scent.

Skill
Beginner
Method
Cold process
Batch
1000 g of oils about 1395 g of batter
Hands-on
1 hour
Cure
6 weeks
Gel phase
Either way gel or not, both work
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What you need

For 1000 g of oils, which fills a 1.5 litre loaf mould. Weigh everything, liquids included.

Olive Oil · 55.0 % 550 g 19.40 oz
Shea Butter · 20.0 % 200 g 7.05 oz
Coconut Oil · 10.0 % 100 g 3.53 oz
Castor Oil · 5.0 % 50 g 1.76 oz
Rice Bran Oil · 10.0 % 100 g 3.53 oz
Sodium hydroxide (NaOH) · the lye, 100 % pure 127.7 g 4.50 oz
Distilled water · for a 33 % lye solution 253.9 g 8.96 oz
Sodium lactate (60 % solution) · 2 tsp, stirred into the lye solution once it has stopped steaming; helps this soft, olive-rich batter firm up for unmoulding 13.1 g 0.46 oz
Superfat
8 %
Temperatures
Oils and lye solution each at 35 to 40 °C (95 to 104 °F)

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Method

  1. Get ready

    Put on splash goggles, nitrile gloves and long sleeves, open a window or turn on the extractor fan, and keep children and pets out of the room. Line a 1.5 litre loaf mould and set it on a level surface where it can stay for two days.

  2. Weigh the oils

    Weigh 200 g shea butter and 100 g coconut oil into the soaping pot, and 550 g olive oil, 100 g rice bran oil and 50 g castor oil into a jug.

  3. Make the lye solution

    Weigh 253.9 g distilled water into a heat-safe jug and 127.7 g sodium hydroxide into a dry container. At the open window or under the fan, pour the lye slowly into the water, never the water onto the lye, and stir until it is clear.

  4. Add the sodium lactate

    When the solution has stopped steaming, stir in 2 tsp (13.1 g) sodium lactate, then leave the jug to cool, labelled and out of reach.

  5. Melt the butters

    Melt the shea butter and coconut oil together on the lowest heat until clear, take the pot off the heat and pour in the olive, rice bran and castor oils.

  6. Check the temperatures

    Carry on when the oils and the lye solution are each between 35 and 40 °C (95 and 104 °F). Much cooler, and the shea can start to set in grains before the batter has traced.

  7. Combine

    Pour the lye solution into the oils down the shaft of the stick blender, tap the blender on the bottom of the pot to let trapped air out, and keep the blade under the surface while it runs.

  8. Blend to light trace

    Pulse for a few seconds, stir with the blender off, and repeat until the batter is opaque and a drizzle leaves a faint line on the surface. With this much olive oil it can take several minutes; light trace is enough, so do not chase a thick one.

  9. Pour and cover

    Pour into the mould, tap it on the worktop to raise air bubbles, and smooth the top. Lay a sheet of baking paper on the surface to keep soda ash off, then a board or lid; a towel on top is optional.

  10. Clean up

    With your gloves still on, wipe the batter off the pot and tools with paper towels into the bin, then wash them in hot soapy water.

  11. Unmould and cut

    After 36 to 48 hours, when the loaf is firm and has pulled away from the sides, unmould it with gloves on and cut it into bars about 2.5 cm (1 in) thick. If it smears on the knife, give it another day.

  12. Cure

    Stand the bars on edge on a rack, a finger's width apart, in a dry, airy room out of the sun for six weeks, turning them every few days. They start a little soft and slippery, and like any olive-rich soap they keep getting harder and milder for months.

Tips

  • The sodium lactate is optional. Leave it out and the loaf may need an extra day in the mould before it cuts cleanly; the lye stays the same.
  • Unrefined shea butter leaves a faint nutty smell and a cream tint. Refined shea gives a whiter, almost odourless bar; choose Refined Shea Butter in the calculator so it works out the lye.
  • If you want no coconut at all, the coconut-free bar and the coconut-free oat and chamomile bar leave every lauric oil out; for a baby bar, see the baby bar.

Why make it

With only 10 % coconut oil this bar scores 7 for cleansing on our scale, against 17 for a bar with a quarter coconut oil, and 69 for conditioning. It suits dry skin, frequent hand-washing and anyone who finds ordinary soap leaves their skin tight. Lauric acid, the main fatty acid in coconut oil, is where most of a soap's bite comes from: in a Dutch repeated-wash test, pure sodium laurate soap irritated most volunteers, though the authors point out that a real bar mixes in milder chain lengths. Dermatologists advise people with dry, sensitive skin to use gentle, fragrance-free cleansers, so nothing is added to scent it. For eczema the NHS goes further and suggests washing with an emollient instead of soap, so this is a bar for skin that gets on with soap. "Gentler" here describes the fatty acids and nothing more. The trade-off is a quieter, creamier lather and a bar that is softer while young.

Sources

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 4.9 %
  • Myristic acid 2.0 %
  • Palmitic acid 11.1 %
  • Stearic acid 10.5 %
  • Ricinoleic acid 4.4 %
  • Oleic acid 52.7 %
  • Linoleic acid 11.5 %
  • Other 3.3 %

Saturated : unsaturated 30 : 70

Hardness 28 below 29–54
Cleansing 7 below 12–22
Conditioning 69 44–69
Bubbly lather 11 below 14–46
Creamy lather 26 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

11 variations

The same soap with one thing moved. Each opens in the calculator ready to change again.

From the guides

All guides
Intermediate 9 min read

Fatty acids and soap qualities: what the numbers mean

The eight fatty acids behind how a bar behaves, how the five quality numbers are summed from them, where the usual ranges came from and when to ignore them.
Intermediate 11 min read

Superfat and lye discount: why recipes leave some oil unsaponified

What superfat and lye discount mean, how the calculator applies them, where makers set them for each soap, and why oil added at trace isn't the oil left over.
Intermediate 13 min read

Water in soap: lye concentration, water discounting and master batches

Water as % of oils, lye concentration and water:lye ratio are one number. What more or less water does to trace and cure, how low to go, and master batching.

Where these proportions come from

Our own formulation: coconut oil, the only lauric oil, is held to 10 % because the cleansing figure follows lauric and myristic acid directly; olive, rice bran and castor oil and shea butter make up the rest, at an 8 % superfat.

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