This soap is rather intoxicating; sweet, spicy, and reminiscent of steamy beaches in southern Asia (if I had any memories such memories, that is). I love its soft purple swirl, its rich lather, and the slip the clay adds, making it a great shaving soap as well.
I’ll confess that this is one of the few times I’ll use fragrance oil over essential oil. With 5mL of jasmine absolute running $50–$100, I just wasn’t feeling that inspired to invest in the real thing!
The sandalwood is a “nature identical essential oil” that blends essential oils and other… things… to get something pretty close to the original. The lavender is a real essential oil, though—it’s cheap enough for me!
Jasmine, Lavender, and Sandalwood Soap
40% olive oil (pomace) (USA / Canada)
25% refined coconut oil (USA / Canada)
20% lard
10% unrefined shea butter (USA / Canada)
5% castor oil (USA / Canada)Per 500g (1.1lbs) oils:
- 1 tbsp white kaolin clay (USA / Canada)
- 2 tsp titanium dioxide
- 6g jasmine essential or fragrance oil
- 6g sandalwood essential or fragrance oil
- 3g lavender essential oil
- Purple oxide, as needed
5% superfat
Follow standard soap making procedures, adding the titanium dioxide and clay at trace (I highly recommend blending them together in a coffee grinder first to break up clumps). I find this recipe traces quickly without the use of an immersion blender, so don’t feel like you need one.
For a purple swirl, split the batch in two after adding the clay, titanium dioxide, and essential/fragrance oils. Gradually stir small amounts of purple oxide into one half until you’ve achieved the colour you want. Alternate pouring the two halves into the mold, and then run your spoon through the raw soap a few times, twisting to swirl.
I really like this recipe, but what can i use in place of lard? Also, are titanium dioxide and the coloring purple oxide natural ingredients? Thank you.
Aaliyah, I wrote an entire blog on using lard in soaps, I’d recommend reading it.
Iron oxides are inorganic compounds that are mined and then cleansed to remove any impurities. They’re the same things that give clays like French Green their colour. Titanium dioxide is also a naturally occurring inorganic compound, and it is commonly used in sunscreen as a physical UV ray blocking agent (its white colour reflects rays away from your skin). Both ingredients are rated a low hazard on Skin Deep as long as you are not snorting lines of them 😛 They are both very popular ingredients in natural, organic cosmetics.
You stated “They are both very popular ingredients in natural, organic cosmetics.” referring to titanium dioxide and the coloring purple oxide.
This is incorrect information. Micas, iron oxides, titanium dioxides and other mineral pigments are not on the approved list of substances allowed in an organic product. So only a product lying about being organic, would use these ingredients. Using them makes an organic claim illegal.
Where is this list? I am interested in seeing it. Is it an American list? Canadian standards on organic cosmetics do not seem to include a list of forbidden ingredients beyond the Cosmetic Ingredient Hotlist, which applies to all cosmetics. And, of course titanium dioxide and iron oxides cannot actually be “organic” (in the sense of agricultural production standards), as they are naturally occuring inorganic compounds. They can, however (according to Canadian guidelines), be included in otherwise organic products, though they would not be listed as organic ingredients as they simply can never be organic (something like with this sunscreen: http://www.coolasuncare.com/sunscreen-spf-30-tint-mineral).
The USDA NOP regulates the use of the term “organic” and they make the laws for what ingredients are allowed in Organic products in the USA. The link to the National List is on the USDA website: http://www.ams.usda.gov/AMSv1.0/ams.fetchTemplateData.do?template=TemplateA&navID=NationalOrganicProgram&page=NOPNationalOrganicProgramHome&resultType=&topNav=&leftNav=NationalOrganicProgram&acct=nop
Hmm, that link does not seem to work. I just get a blank page.
It works for me – make sure you use the entire URL.
Or start here and navigate to the National List frm the main USDA NOP page: http://www.ams.usda.gov/AMSv1.0/nop
Great blog! I’m trying to get rid of the chemicals in our home and the next thing on my to do list is make my own soap. Where can I purchase stuff like kaolin clay and titanium dioxide, a local health shop? Or is it purchased online. If so can you please recommend an online store. ~Thanks. 🙂
Marge—I get everything from New Directions Aromatics. I don’t recommend buying these ingredients from your local health food shop as things are generally marked up 4–10x! Ouch!
I recommend Essential Wholesale for cosmetic/soap supplies: http://www.essentialwholesale.com/
If you are interested in making natural, cold-processed soap – skip the synthetic fragrances and the artificial colors! Those “other things” in the synthetic fragrance are often petrochemicals, phthalates and other hazardous – or if you have asthma – life threatening ingredients. They also do not biodegrade. There are PLENTY of 100% natural ingredients. To learn more about what is and what is not natural (and soap is covered as an exception to the “rule”) http://www.naturalingredient.org/resources.htm
Sue—If you poke around, you’ll see that 99.9% of my soaps and other various concoctions don’t use anything artificial, so I’m pretty familiar with natural ingredients. I don’t like artificial fragrances—they stick around forever and the scent is never as nice as the real thing. I bought the fragrance oils I used here when I first got started out (probably in some mild fit of insanity), and they’ve just been sitting in my cupboard ever since & I wanted to use them up. I wouldn’t buy them again—my kitchen STILL smells of faux-jasmine, and it’s just gross how long it’s stuck around. And yes, there are plenty of natural ingredients, but if you read through the entry you’ll see there was no way I was spending the money it would cost to get the natural version of any of these EOs. I’ll just do without from now on.
I love your blog!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I literally got lost in it. I spent over an hour browsing around.
Thanks for stopping by, Gerda! I’m thrilled you love my blog 😀 Don’t forget to come back, I’ve got lots of great entries planned for the future!
Wonderful inspiration Marie, thanks for sharing your awesome creativity with us on your blog!
I’ve worked on converting your recipe to a 2 lb. loaf using ounce measurements and am going to try it for a shaving soap. I’ve never made cold process soap before so this will be a fun experiment, also want to add some color using Alkanet root powder infused in olive oil. I’m not sure what fragrance/essential oils to use yet.
Thank you for adding the links to where you buy products also!
I’m thrilled to hear it! Where do you get your alkanet root powder?
I’ve purchased the Alkanet Root powder through Mountain Rose Herbs in the USA.
Thanks! I need to find a Canadian source, over-the-border shipping is rarely worth the cost or the hassle :\
Hi Marie,
I was wondering, is the Kaolin clay necessary for this recipe? Can I just omit it from the ingredients without some kind of weird result?
The kaolin is for the slip that makes this bar shave friendly. You can leave it out, but I wouldn’t recommend using it as a shaving soap—that’s a recipe for razor burn!
I recently bought a bottle of the “nature identical” sandalwood, and am wondering if you would use less than you normally would an essential oil? I usually use about 28g of eo per batch….
Hi Julie! From my experience with the nature identical oils I’d use the same amount as usual 🙂
hello…how would i convert percentages in the recipes into ounces??
Hi Miriam! I’ve covered this in the FAQ 🙂
Hi Marie,
I don’t have any Kaolin clay or Titanium Dioxide and was wondering what the difference would be in the soap if I didn’t include these ingredients, such as color, texture, etc.
Please help!
Hi Jade! Without the titanium dioxide the bar won’t be quite the same colour (titanium dioxide whitens the bar), and without the clay it won’t have the same slip, so you won’t be able to use it to shave. It’ll still be a nice bar of soap, though 🙂
Nice recipe. Interesting to see how other soapers improvise sometimes. I also often will make substitutions of one sort or another when exorbitant costs are involved. I find that I can tolerate a small amount of synthetic verses a huge dent in my pocketbook as well, and my product is still much better than a store bought product in terms of cost, appeal, and chemical exposure. I have three special needs children I adopted that have extremely sensitive skin and they do fine with small amounts of fragrance oil in my homemade soaps and lotions. Keep up the Good blogging Marie!
Thanks, Carrie! I always enjoy reading about the changes my readers make to my recipes—and how they work (and don’t, on occasion, haha). Thanks for reading!
hi just wondering what fresh jersey milk recipes you have if any with no lye, keen ozzie mumma looking to use the rest of my daily milk down on the farm
Hi Eva! Beyond milk baths and clay masks hydrated with milk, there’s not a lot of beauty type things you can do with milk that will last if you don’t use some lye and turn it into soap (along with lots of other ingredients, of course). Have you thought about making yoghurt and cheese? I’ve always found those things use TONS of milk!
I have used the OE combo for a face cream. What a rich, luxurious scent!
Oooh, lovely! Pure luxury 😀
Hi. I recently got some monoi de Tahiti oil and LOVE the smell. Do you think if I substituted some for part of the coconut oil the smell would survive and come thru in the end? Thanks
It is very strong, so there’s a chance, but I think you’d probably need at least 20% monoi in the soap for it to come through, which I imagine would be fairly pricey—and it would be a huge bummer to use less and not have it come through at all :/
I follow your blog and subscribe to the Humblebee newsletter. I love your recipes. You got me started making lotions with the lemon chiffon recipe. Keep up the great work and thanks for the inspiration!
Thanks so much, Lynn! Happy making 😀