I may watch too much Downton Abbey, but I feel like this is the sort of bath oil Lady Mary would use. Fragrant, gentle, and luxurious, it smells like an English garden in the summer, and makes for a lovely break from dark winter days.
The base of the bath oil is a combination of Turkey Red Oil and olive oil (pomace) (USA / Canada). Turkey Red Oil self emulsifies in water, and will take the olive oil (pomace) (USA / Canada) with it (to a point, of course). This makes for a moisturizing bath that doesn’t present a serious safety hazard when you go to climb out of your tub. If you don’t have Turkey Red Oil you can use more olive oil (pomace) (USA / Canada) in its place, but do be careful when you get up after your bath, and make sure you wipe it down afterwards so you don’t catch the next bather by slippery surprise 🙂
Up next—essential oils. I’ve chosen a medley of floral scents and blended them with some citrussy scents to cut the sweetness. Rose geranium mingles with bright lemon, dry petitgrain, and intoxicating neroli to create a rich, decadent scent blend that isn’t overwhelming.
Well, what are you waiting for? Grab a book, draw a bath, and indulge.
English Garden Bath Oil
35g Turkey Red Oil
30g olive oil (pomace) (USA / Canada)40 drops rose geranium essential oil
15 drops lemon essential oil
10 drops petitgrain essential oil
9 drops neroli essential oil (3% dilution)Combine all ingredients in a bottle and stir or shake to combine.
To use, draw a hot bath and add a few tablespoons of the oil while the tap is still running. Enjoy with some light waltzes playing in the background, and perhaps a few candles.
Because of the lemon essential oil, be sure to rinse off thoroughly if you are going outside within a few hours of your bath so you don’t get a sunburn. No worries if you’re off to bed, though.
Dear Marie , I love every recipe you share. You are an inspiration. I am becoming DIY ing addict !!! Lol
I’m so glad to hear it! Embrace the addiction 😉 You are in good company 🙂
Marie. Could a sufactant be added to this, how would it be incorparated. Thank you
Tried it myself with SLSA. Didin’t foam much.
Good to know!
It would take quite a lot of re-working as surfactants are water soluble. It’s possible, I’m sure, but it’s definitely not a “just add” sort of deal.
Sounds divine….might just try to make it when I am doing caring work in the U.K. for a year. Thank you! 🙂
Enjoy! Thanks for reading 🙂
I bet that feels and smells lovely. Just wondering, how does the scent of litsea cubeba essential oil compare to lemon essential oil?
Hi Ana! I find litsea cubeba to bit a bit drier than lemon, but definitely still very bright and citrussy 🙂
Hi Marie,
I’m loving DIYing with your fabulous recipes. I love bath oils and I’ll give this recipe a crack. I’m wondering if you’ve ever used L’Occitane’s almond shower oil. I love how my skin feels after using this, but after a little DIYing, I’m not so sure about the additives in the ingredient list. I was wondering if you might have a go at duping it? It seems to have a lot of oil in it, but it also lathers up when used.
Rosy
Hi Rosy! From what I can tell the L’Occitane almond shower oil is less oil, more detergent—oil doesn’t lather! I’ve never tried it, but I’ll keep my eye out for a sample at Sephora when I’m there next 😉 As an alternative you might try making your own liquid soap and adding some almond oil when you dilute it.
What is turkey red oil? I’ve never heard of it. I’m new to DIY so it’s not surprising.
You can read more about it here 🙂
The link to more info on Turkey Red Oil doesn’t seem to be working, at least for me on my iPhone.
hi,
saw your blog yesterday and you are very good indeed. I never thought about making soap before now, your enthusiasm is inspiring. So I read a lot online and I know more now than yesterday. Not sure about the proportions. I guess it can be worked out like a ceramic by adding all the molecular weights together to get the proportion a bit more than 3 fatty acids to 1 glycerol or something ?
I saw the soapcalc briefly but I like to know how things work.
cheers
Hi Mick! I’m afraid my knowledge of soaping chemistry does not drill down to the molecular weight level at all! This looks like a good place to start some more in-depth reading 🙂
Hi, Marie: What can I substitute for pettigrain or Neroli diluted? I don’t know much about combination, e.g. what do you think about rose and lavender e.o.? Thanks!
Both petitgrain and neroli are citrussy, but also sort of dry and dusty, if that makes sense. I’d probably choose something citrussy as my first choice for an alternative 🙂
Hi Marie, can CASTOR OIL TURKEY RED be used to solubilze essential oils before adding to water based serums, gels etc? How would I do this?
Thanks, Nadia
I don’t really recommend it; it technically can (I have in the past), but it’s really old tech—it was the first ever synthetic detergent (castor oil + sulfuric acid). It’s heavy, prone to irritate skin (especially in higher concentration leave-on applications), and I find it goes rancid pretty quickly (erk). I’d recommend other solubilizers, like the polysorbates or cromollient SCE, depending on the specific product 🙂
Hi, I tried making this recipe with a few tweaks, I used Sweet Almond Oil instead of Olive Oil, as well as a tiny bit of vitamin E and only Rosemary Essential Oil. When I stirred it, it became very thick like a pudding… any idea what would make this happen?
Hmm, that’s very odd and not something I would’ve expected! I’d try simple combinations of other oils + your turkey red oil and see if it keeps happening.
Should the ratio of the turkey red oil to the other oil always be 7 to 6 to help emulsify the other oil with the bath water or can you go higher with the other oil?
It will vary by oil, but we are also less concerned about stability in a bath since it only needs to work for ~20 minutes rather than months 🙂 You could likely go higher with the real oil, just be sure to take notes and keep an eye on things!
Hello. You mention storing in plastic. Do you think PET would be ok for storing this oil? Would the oils eat through the plastic?
Thank you.
Hey! I’m not sure if you are commenting on the right post as the only times the word “plastic” appears on this page is in your comment? This project is almost entirely carrier oils, so it would be fine in a PET bottle—they also sell cooking oil in PET bottles, which is pretty much to the same thing from a packaging standpoint.
Hi Marie,
Apologies. You say bottle – which in my head translated to PET bottle at the time because that’s what I have – ha ha.
Still haven’t made this, but I will one day – it sounds so lovely.
All the best.
Hi- a question about the amount in the RTO and the olive oil. The recipe calls for 35’g’ and 30 ‘g’ – is that grams? If so, that is the equivalent of just over 2 tablespoons each or approximately 5 tablespoons total…and the amount of drops of EOs seems WAY to high
for 5 tablespoons of oil. Are these measurements correct?
With thanks!
Yes, ‘g’ = grams—that’s the globally accepted short form for grams. You cannot assume that 1g = 1 mL with oils, though, so your tablespoon calculation is not correct as it assumes the oils have the same density as water.
Do remember that this recipe is designed to be dispersed in an entire bath tub of water (not all in one use, either), hence the higher concentration of essential oils 🙂