Love a hydrating, relaxing bath? These Creamy Lavender Meadow Bath Melts are about to become your favourite thing. These little nuggets of cocoa-shea goodness quickly melt into your hot bath, leaving your with a lavender scented tub of water to soak away your worries in.
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One of my biggest beefs with bath melts and bath oils in general are their tendency to try to murder me. After a lovely, relaxing soak with a good book or a podcast I’ll drain the tub and then nearly die trying to step out of my oil slick of a bathtub, which rather ruins the entire effect with a massive adrenaline rush. I am happy to assure you that these bath melts are not at all homicidal thanks to the inclusion of some emulsifying wax.
This super simple addition means the melts fully and easily emulsify into your bath water, with two awesome benefits: 1) all your bath water has the hydrating goodness of cocoa butter (USA / Canada) and unrefined shea butter (USA / Canada) spread through it, not just that one weird floating blob on the surface; 2) all those oils just wash straight down the drain, leaving you with a minimally murderous tub. Sweet!
I chose a blend of sweet, calming lavender and bright fir balsam and spruce hemlock essential oils for a scent blend that’s warm, clean, and fresh—I imagine it smells something like wandering through a lavender meadow on a spring day. If you really want the scent blend to shine I’d recommend using deodorized shea and cocoa butter (USA / Canada)s, but if you’re the kind of person who loves chocolate in everything, unrefined cocoa butter (USA / Canada) works beautifully as well.
To keep these bath melts quick melting I didn’t add any wax, so you’ll need to put them in the fridge to set, and if you live somewhere quite warm you might want to store them in the fridge as well. I used a silicone ice cube tray as a mould (this one—isn’t it cute?!), but you could also use candy moulds or a normal ice cube tray. If you use a silicone thing, be sure to pop it on a plate before you start pouring so you can easily move it to the fridge without it flopping about on you.
The final melts easily dissolve into a tub of hot water with a wee bit of lather, setting you up for some serious pampering. Enjoy!
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Creamy Lavender Meadow Bath Melts
10g | 0.35oz complete emulsifying wax (not beeswax!)
10g | 0.35oz unrefined shea butter (USA / Canada)
20g | 0.7oz cocoa butter (USA / Canada)10 drops lavender essential oil
7 drops fir essential oil
5 drops spruce hemlock essential oil (this essential oil is not at all related to poisonous hemlock)Weigh the emulsifying wax, unrefined shea butter (USA / Canada), and cocoa butter (USA / Canada) into a heat resistant glass measuring cup and place that measuring cup in a small saucepan with about 5cm/2″ of water in it. Bring that water to a bare simmer (it shouldn’t be tossing the measuring cup around) and heat everything through to melt, stirring occasionally to help speed things along.
Once everything has melted, remove the measuring cup from the water bath and dry the outside of it with a dishtowel. Stir in the essential oils and then pour the melted mixture into your moulds, placing them in the fridge for at least one hour to solidify. I used this adorable little silicone ice cube mould from Amazon. The time they’ll take to solidify will vary with how large you make each melt, but I do recommend keeping them on the small side to help them melt faster. Mine are roughly the size of the tip of my thumb and I wouldn’t go any larger than that.
If you don’t have fir balsam and spruce hemlock essential oil, any bright, crisp coniferous tree essential oil will work. Pine, fir, and spruce (of any variety—there’s a few kinds of each) are all great and will work for either or both of the essential oils listed. I find cedarwood to be too soft for the effect we’re looking for here.
I got this adorable vintage tin from Stepback on Broadway in Vancouver, BC.
You rock, Marie! I love this sort of thing in a relaxing bath. My husband hates them because of the slippery bathtub he has to step into for his next shower. Thank you for finding something we can both be happy with.
Thanks, Jennifer! Just be sure to make ’em small enough/run a hot enough belt that they fully melt and you’re off to the races 😀
Hi! Love this recipe…but mine begin to sweat and melt before they ever get to the bath (Florida?)…is there a way to make this melt slower without using more cocoa butter?
Hey Jennifer! I’d recommend reading this and this FAQ 🙂 Our challenge here is creating something that will still melt readily in the bath that is stable at room temperature (whatever that is for you). It doesn’t necessarily have to be cocoa butter, but to raise the melting point you will need more of something with a higher melting point—but that may compromise how it melts in the bath. It’s -30°C here now, so I’m really envious of this problem! Happy experimenting!
Oh wow! Never thought of using emulsifying wax to get it to blend into the bath water!
Going to try and incorporate that into my existing bath melt recipe! 🙂
Your scent combination sounds beautiful! I need to try that!
Thanks, Tahira! Enjoy 😀
Hi Marie. It sounds like a delicious recipe.
I’m a little confused. How do you use it? As soap, lotion bar or melted in water?
Hi Angie! It’s a bath melt, so you put it in your bath, and let it melt 😉 It’s like solid bath oils!
Thanks Marie, I can’t wait to try it!!
Does is leave a gross residue in the tub?
The whole point is that they don’t 🙂 Check out the video to see how they melt into nothing! As long as they melt, you’re golden—if you don’t like baths hot enough to melt them/you make big ones, I recommend pre-melting them in just-boiled water and adding that to your bath water.
Great idea 😉 will emulsimse work as the wax? Thank you for all your awesome recipes and inspirations!
Yup—any complete emulsifying wax will work, and emulsimulse is a complete emulsifying wax 🙂
Dear Marie! Can I use Olivem as emulsifying wax? Thank you!
I’ve never worked with it, but it looks like it should work.
What an interesting idea, thank you. I love the tin and the store name as well!
Thanks, Michelle!
this is brilliant! this is the first bath melt recipe I’ve ever wanted to make. It never seemed like a good idea to put solid fats/butters down the drain. but now a solution presents itself!
do I need to keep the water at any particular amount in order to stay within the emulsifying capabilities of the e-wax?
Thanks, Emily! These will self-emulsify in any amount of water, that water just needs to be hot enough to melt them. So, you either need to make ’em really small, love hot baths, or pre-melt them in a bit of just-boiled water and add ’em to your tub after they’ve liquified 🙂
Hi! I love this recipe and I’m so excited to try it!
I was wondering if it’s possible to use coconut oil(the solid kind) instead of the Shea Butter? My sister in law hates Shea Butter so she won’t use these if they have Shea Butter. Or if its not possible to use coconut oil can I just exclude the Shea Butter all together?
You can certainly try it, but do keep in mind the drastically different melting points; there’s a difference of about 14°C, so the end product will be far softer and more melt prone. I suggest trying it with a very small batch first. Also, read up on shea butter + alternatives in the Humblebee & Me DIY Encyclopedia (https://www.humblebeeandme.com/diy-encyclopedia/) 🙂 Happy making!
These look so cute! I love them for a Mother’s Day gift. I’m also experimenting with the idea of making a “bathtub cleansing bomb” so I can easily rinse/clean the tub after the soak. Your toilet cleaning bombs are my starting point : )
Thanks for all the wonderful ideas!
Ooh, what a neat idea! I hope you’ll share what you come up with 🙂 Happy making!
These look incredible and would make such a lovely gift.
Thanks, Kaylee! 🙂
Update! I had to make these. Love ’em (unsurprisingly). Wish I had winter dry skin to moisturize, for an excuse to take more luxurious baths! They do take a while to melt so next time I will add them with the running bath water to help them out. Thanks again for another wonderful recipe.
Woohoo! Thanks so much for DIYing with me and enjoy your not-so-dry-not-so-wintery skin, haha 😛
http://www.housebeautiful.com/lifestyle/news/a6039/titanic-menus/
Have you seen this?
Also, I love your ice trays.
Hey Melissa! I haven’t seen that particular article, but I do have a fantastic book called Last Dinner on the Titanic that’s full of menus and a TON of very intimidating recipes. It’s a beautiful read if you’re interested in the Titanic and fussy early 1900’s food 🙂
love this ! wheres the adorable mold from ?
It’s the Outset Hex Ice Cube Tray
from Amazon 🙂
Thanks so much, Marie
I’m checking them out right now 🙂 You ROCK !
Brilliant! Great problem solving! Thank you for yet another fabulous idea :).
Thanks, Anne! 😀
I’m also wondering where you got the fantastic mold from? Thanks for all the amazing recipes!!!
It’s the Outset Hex Ice Cube Tray
from Amazon—isn’t it adorable?
Made these and tested them tonight. Thank you for sharing your recipes. Loving not slipping when exiting bath 🙂
Woohoo! Thanks so much for reading and DIYing with me 😀 Happy bath time!
This was not only insightful but such a funny article! Loved it! I will be making these for me just like your recipe but I would like to make some for my mom and knowing her she won’t put them in the fridge, what can I add to make them a little firmer but still melt in hot water? She lives in Florida and its get so hot there.
Thanks, Taina! Unfortunately you are asking for a way to raise the melting point without raising the melting point… not possible! 😛 I find they’re already a bit tricky to melt in a hot bath, I wouldn’t make them any harder and expect them to melt well at all.
Makes perfect sense! Thank you so much for taking time to answer even silly questions. Makes your blog an even better one because you took time to write! Taina
No worries! Happy DIYing
Hi Marie,
Im new to this and wondering about the emulsifying waxes. I looked up Emulsimulse and it seems like it is only under that name in Canada. Regardless, I have been able to locate the NF one, at Mountain Rose, brambleberry and even amazon. The NF will work? Have you used any of the brands above? One you liked more than the other. I love the idea of this recipe and want to try it out. Thanks for sharing all your great stuff!
Hey Ann! I have an FAQ and an experiment on e-waxes that’ll give you all the information you need 🙂
Yes, I love this but am wondering if you have any other measurements to use so I do not have to go purchase a scale for the amts used ?
Can not wait to make these.
Hey Carolyn! I’ve written a few FAQs on this—check ’em out here 🙂
Hey Marie,
Great recipe, I sure do wanna try it! Do you suppose it is possible to use a bit of clay as a colorant here, or is it a bad idea? I’d sure kuid to give these melts a bit of visual brightness!
Thank you!
You definitely can, but keep in mind the clay is not soluble and will likely remain in the tub afterwards, necessitating some cleaning 🙂
Thanks Marie!
I made recently these, and they are really hard to melt in the bath, so I had to smash them with my hand. But the tub wasn’t too slippery, jay!
I used this emulse:
http://www.aroma-zone.com/info/fiche-technique/emulsifiant-emulsan-aroma-zone
so I wonder, can it be not just an emulsifier? Why should it be an emulsifying WAX?
Thanks!
I chose a wax because I wanted the melts to be solid, and if it was a liquid, even if they were solid, they’d be very tenuously so and highly to melt well before you could use them, in which case making a bath oil would probably be preferable as you could choose a more appropriate package. A blend of a liquid and a solid could probably work, but would definitely require some experimenting to get that precise blend nailed down 🙂
Boy I really messed these up. I substituted the cocoa butter for sal and tucuma butters as I only had raw cocoa butter. They are so hard when they’re in the tub, they never completely melt, little layers of unmelted floaties everywhere. Obviously the melting points of butters is way too high. Dang it. They smell beautiful though
Aww bummer 🙁 At least you can melt down the leftovers and use them to make a lotion or something; a bit of math and a spreadsheet should help you sort out how much of what ingredients you have in your leftover bath melts and you can create a lotion from there, or just a body butter with some emulsifying wax in it.
Hi Marie,
Thanks for your inspiration and your great recipes. I loved the idea of these bath melts.
I didn’t have the right ingredients, so I substituted mango for the shea butter and illipe for the cocoa butter. After I made the first batch, I went down to my local soap supply store and bought the proper ingredients. I came home and made a second batch, exactly following your recipe. I discovered the first batch works better and melts much more smoothly. I like them both though and I think it would be really nice to throw a couple into the water when I’m soaking my feet, just before giving myself a pedicure. I haven’t tried these in a bath yet. How many do you toss into the tub?
How interesting! I don’t think I’ve ever worked with illipe butter before, I should add it to one of my many carts to play with 🙂 I usually use 5ish, but it’s hardly an exact science 😛
Could i use it in a shower as a moisturizer?
something like Lush King of skin ?
could i make one solid bar to be rubbed on every time after a shower
Definitely! You should include a broad-spectrum oil soluble preservative like Phenonip if you plan on making a single large bar that will get wet and then be left to dry; that is a hot bed for bacterial growth. These melts don’t need a preservative on their own because they are single use, but as soon as they aren’t and water is involved, they need to be preserved 🙂
I made a large bar with Phenonip and its amazing so moisturizing but it becomes very soft and melts a lot
how could I make it a bit harder and less to melt
The Lush bar King of skin is very moisturizing but harder
These are specifically designed to melt at very low temperatures, so I’m not surprised it does! Try making a recipe that isn’t designed to melt on touch, like this 🙂
Thanks a million Marie but actually I wanted to make something for the shower with emulsifying wax because with bees wax it wouldn’t work as an in shower moisturizer
AH! Try adding some stearic acid to the original formula 🙂
I’m fairly new to lotion making and have a question about the Creamy Lavender Meadow bath melts. What is the storage life for these melts and should a preservative be used in them? Thanks
Hey Debbie! Check out the FAQ; there are lots of helpful articles in there about preservatives.
Thanks for this information! Adding the ewax is a game changer. Thanks dor being generous with your knowledge.
Thanks for reading! 🙂
Hi Marie
I keep trying to make these bath melts with cocoa butter and ewax but they end up soft and squidgy and fall apart. Can ewax go off? How can I make them harder. I tried BtMs 50 and the same thing happened.
Thanks for your advice
Hey Sue! These need to be soft (with a low melting point) so they melt in bath water; I experimented with harder ones and they were solid blobs that gunked up the drain and tub water. Even these require quite hot water to melt—I wouldn’t make them any firmer unless you literally boil your bath water! You will likely have to keep them in the fridge if you live somewhere warm.
Hi Marie, sorry, I keep commenting heaps! But for the emulsifying wax, they have a couple on the new directions website, but I wasn’t sure which solid one would be best for these bath melts
Polawax is always a solid choice!
Hi Marie I am your one of those fans who wait anxiously for Mondays and Thursdays
Could you suggest how I could modify this recipe to make a copycat Lush King of skin Body butter bar?
Hey Nina! I honestly have no idea what’s going on with that bar as it is (apparently) fruit salad mashed up with some cocoa butter if the ingredients list is to be believed… and I sort of doubt it is. There’s no emulsifiers or preservatives in there, and with “fresh fruit” you’d need both—and even then, truly fresh fruit is impossible to preserve, so… yeah. Something doesn’t add up there :/
The best thing to do with fresh fruit is eat it.
I’m wondering if this will clog drains over time?
It will if not used in hot enough water to melt them and emulsify them into water. If they thoroughly emulsify into a large amount of water it shouldn’t be an issue, but if you’ve got solid bits floating around at the end of the bath definitely scoop those out and bin them 🙂
Hi Marie,
I would like to add shimmer. How much mica would you use?
I’d probably start with 1/4 tsp but do see what you think 🙂
Hi Maria! Awesome recipe . I have made these with and without the emulsified wax. The ones with the wax creates a light foamy bubble when I have the tub jets on. The ones I have made without the wax has no bubble with jets on. The emulsified wax creates a light bubble? Is this normal?
Yup, totally normal—emulsifying waxes are technically a type of surfactant, like soap or Sodium Cocoyl Isethionate (SCI) 🙂
I make a version of these – mine are solid at room temperature, but melt easily in the bath. I use 63% cocoa butter, 2% essential oils, and 35% Lumerol K – a waterless surfactant.
INCI Name
– Laureth 4
– Mipa-Laureth Sulfate
– Propylene Glycol
Thanks for sharing! I’ll have to keep an eye out for the Lumerol K 🙂
It was the first thing I ever made – although it’s so easy it hardly qualifies as DIY! My younger son was given some bath melts for his 5th birthday and he adored them (he gets dry skin, from me, poor little sod). But the cost of them made me sit down and pour a stiff drink – it’s not uncommon for them to cost £3-4 each, which is a lot for a small boy’s daily bath.
A lot of the home-made ones for sale and not adequate – nothing to emulsify, so you get globules of floating cocoa or shea butter, and the bath doubles as a lethal oil slick after the water has drained.
They still aren’t the cheapest thing to use, because they are 100% actual ingredients, no water. But I buy a kilo of cocoa butter at a time (£11) and a litre of lumerol. I reckon my 22g bath melts therefore cost about 31p each, which is a considerable improvement on £3.50
https://www.aromantic.co.uk/blogs/recipes/foaming-bath-melts This is the recipe – no connection to me, it’s a UK company I’ve bought several things from.