When was the last time you listened to the entirety of the Lime in the Coconut song? Technically it’s “Coconut” by Harry Nilsson, first released in 1971, but to me it’s just “the Lime in the Coconut” song. The song is definitely a bit ridiculous and the music video is mildly terrifying, but it has unbelievably strong ear worm capacity, for which I suppose I should apologize as you are probably going to be humming it for a few days now. Anyhow, all of this is to say that when I started thinking about making a coconut cleansing oil, this song started playing in my head incessantly, and that’s how this coconut facial cleansing oil became Lime in the Coconut Facial Cleansing Oil.
Let’s quickly recap what makes an oil a cleansing oil? Basically, it’s a blend of oil that includes oil-soluble emulsifiers. Emulsifiers are surfactants, but the ones we’re using here don’t lather up into the fluffy bubbles you might think of when you think about surfactants. These emulsifiers allow us to easily combine the oil cleanser with the water we’re washing our faces with. The oil and the oil-loving end of the emulsifiers will dissolve the gunk on our face, and the water-loving end of the emulsifiers will carry it all down the drain all nice and non-greasy like. This gives us an effective cleanser with a clean rinse-off—double win!
In this cleansing oil I’ve used just one emulsifier—emulsifying wax NF (you could use Polawax or BTMS-50 instead; Emulismulse/Ritamulse should also work, but I haven’t tried it). This makes this recipe a bit more accessible than some of my other cleansing oils that use a liquid emulsifier as well, and it also makes this cleansing oil a bit thicker. This is great, because we’re including some dried coconut milk powder, and that added thickness helps hold it in suspension.
The oil blend is just cheap. That’s really all we’re going for here since you are effectively pouring these oils down the drain after a brief interlude with your face. Feel free to use a different, inexpensive, relatively lightweight oil instead of fractionated coconut oil. Cleansing oils are also a great way to use up oils that are getting close to their expiry date, so if you want to make up a 54g blend of all the oldest oils in your DIY pantry, that’ll work, too. The castor oil helps boost the cleansing power of the oil, so I recommend leaving that as it is.
One of the neatest things about cleansing oils is the really groovy in-between world they live in. They’re 100% oil based in the bottle, so we can include hard-to-preserve, water-soluble things (like coconut milk powder!) without worrying about spoilage. Technically we could do this with anything that’s 100% oil based, like a body butter, but in most cases that would mean having quite a gritty finished product as you’d just have blobs of that water soluble thing lumping around. However, because cleansing oil is mixed with water at the moment of use, that water will dissolve the hard-to-preserve water soluble thing, giving you the awesome experience you want without worrying about spoilage. Sweet, no?
In this particular recipe I chose coconut milk powder as my hard-to-preserve water soluble thing. It’s an ingredient that I don’t get to use a whole lot because, as I noted, it’s hard to preserve once it’s been mixed with water (a can of open coconut milk lasts less than a week in my fridge, so think about what that’d do in a lotion—erk!). However, here it’ll turn into re-hydrated coconut milk at the moment of use, which gives you the most wonderful, lightly coconut-scented super creamy facial cleansing oil. It’s awesome! Just be sure to blitz your coconut milk powder in your DIY-only coffee grinder first, or press it through a sieve; it isn’t hugely inclined to dissolve in water, so the larger chunks can be a touch scrubby for the first few seconds of use if you don’t break ’em up.
We’ll wrap things up with some lime essential oil for that full Lime in the Coconut Facial Cleansing Oil experience. Enjoy!
Lime in the Coconut Facial Cleansing Oil
5g | 0.17oz powdered coconut milk (USA / Canada) (blitz this up in your DIY-only coffee grinder first)
20g | 0.71oz castor oil (USA / Canada)20g | 0.71oz complete emulsifying wax (not beeswax! I used emulsifying wax NF)
54g | 1.9oz fractionated coconut oil0.5g | 0.018oz Vitamin E MT-50 (USA / Canada)
0.5g | 0.018oz lime essential oilPrepare a water bath by bringing about 3cm/1″ of water to a bare simmer over low to medium-low heat in a small saucepan.
Weigh the coconut milk powder and castor oil into a small heat-resistant glass measuring cup and use a flexible silicone spatula to stir that together until as smooth as possible (which isn’t very smooth). Add the emulsifying wax and fractionated coconut oil. Place the measuring cup in your prepared water bath to melt everything through.
Once everything has melted, remove the measuring cup from the heat and dry the outside of it off with a dish towel. Set the measuring cup on a towel or hot pad to insulate it from the counter and stir the mixture with a flexible silicone spatula to combine everything.
Leave the melted mixture to cool for 20–30 minutes before stirring in the vitamin E and essential oils, and then decant into a 120mL/4oz plastic pump-top bottle or a 120ml/4oz squeeze bottle. That’s it!
To use, take a nickel-sized amount of the cleanser into your palm and combine it with a bit of warm water. Massage it into your face and wipe it off with a damp cloth. Follow up with the rest of your skincare routine.
If you live somewhere on the cooler side or have air conditioning I recommend using 15g emulsifying wax and 59g fractionated coconut oil. It’s pretty hot in Calgary right now (~25°C in my bathroom) and mine is close to being too thick to squeeze out of the bottle.
Shelf Life & Storage
Because this cleanser does not contain any water, it does not require a broad-spectrum preservative (broad spectrum preservatives ward off microbial growth, and microbes require water to live—no water, no microbes!). Be sure to keep it dry to ensure it lasts as long as possible—don’t let any water get into the container and it should easily last a year.
Ooh I love the sound of this (I love anything citrussy) I have everythung except the coconut milk, so I will walk over to the shop in the morning and make some in the afternoon. Thanks for another great recipe MMar:-D
Happy making and thanks for reading! 😀
Marie, do you think this would be too thick to go thru a pump bottle?
Definitely! You need something you can squeeze.
Would it be ok to sub with avocado oil in this recipe? It slow to absorb, but, not sure if I’d get the same result…
Yup, as long as you don’t mind that you’d be effectively pouring it down the drain 🙂
So can we substitute any light oil for the coconut oil?
Yes.
I made this today Marie, using safflower oil instead of FCO. Turned out really nice. Next time I’m going to try it with Hazel nut oil, one of my new favorite carrier oils for its drier, astringent properties. The safflower one is terrific however. Then I realized I used the last of my lime eo in another one of your cleansers so I just have a slight coconut scent when I add the water to my hands. Terrific formula!
Oooh, lovely! I’m so glad you’re enjoying it 🙂 I now want to buy alllll the milk powders and try this concept with goats milk and other such things 😀 Thanks for DIYing with me!
I made this with goat’s milk because I didn’t want to wait until I could buy some coconut milk powder. I really like it a lot. I use it with a facial cleanser I make with liquid castile soap and chamomile tea. Completely changed my cleansing routine.
Very cool! I’d recommend giving this a read re: using castile soap on your face 🙂
Thanks! Very interesting read. So now I need to figure out how to balance my cleanser….. Should be fun.
If it’s got soap in it there’s really no way as it will de-saponify 🙁
Yeah, I figured that out eventually! For now, I’ve switched to liquid baby cleansers – gentle and balanced. No time to delve into surfactants right now. I’m having too much fun playing with lotions!
I wouldn’t count on those baby cleansers being the correct pH—they’re usually formulated to be tear-free, which isn’t the same thing 🙂 Also, babies have more basic skin than adults do (neat, eh?). I definitely understand the no time to play with new things, though! I need a clone lol.
Hello!! I am having trouble finding a scale that met the requirements of the Course DIY. I was wondering what brand and model you have maybe It would make buying the scale easier!! I appreciate it
Hi Anna,
This is the one I settled on a year ago when my DIY journey began. Since then, I have seen it in Marie’s awesome photos.
Here’s the description from Amazon.ca:
Smart Weigh Digital Pro Pocket Scale with Back-Lit LCD Display, Tare, Hold and PCS Features 2000 x 0.1-Gram Capacity, 2 Lids Included
It’s small, but so are most of my projects. I did buy the set of calibration weights because I’m that math nerd, however it was an unnecessary purchase as the scale agreed with the weights right out of the box and I’ve never checked them again.
Hi Anna,
Marie wrote an article about scale’s! 🙂 http://www.humblebeeandme.com/faqs/what-should-i-consider-when-purchasing-a-scale/ Good luck!
I’ve got an FAQ on this and I’m pretty sure the course materials are linked, too 🙂
I’m currently using your Creamy Clay Cleansing Calm and it’s amazing but this cleaning oil sounds very intriguing.
Sounds absolutely lovely to make and use for summer!
Going to give it a go this weekend 🙂
Thanks, Clarissa! I’ve got this Lime in the Coconut Cleansing Oil all lined up—I tested it several times before publishing it but I’m making myself finish the last of my green tea cleasing oil before I’m allowed to dive into this one whole-hog haha. I already have too many half finished concoctions laying around!
Can emulsimulse be used instead of emulsifying wax NF? I know you use this in a lot of your recipes.
In theory, yes! My only concern would be that it may get a bit too thick, but if that happens you can always melt it down again and add a bit more liquid oil 🙂
I actually did some creating yesterday (I made a very simple coconut lotion as I wanted to see if the natural scent of the coconut shone through… it smelt exactly like coconut milk!) and that got me thinking, hummm… I’ve a kilo bag of coconut milk powder, what can I do with it. Thought of foot bombs and thought eeek! My feet aren’t worthy of said powder!
Then settled it would be going on my face. Then as I was weighing out my ewax-NF I was thinking of the many many little baggies I have of ewax and how can I use them up? Then was wondering if I could make a liquid cleansing oil with coconut milk powder.
I even dreamt about it last night. I wake up and WHAMO! Guess who thunked about it? The shoe wielding spatula lady!
Lol you and all your little baggies Penny :-p
Best part about having this hobby in China? (if you are just starting out, years ago this never happened) China sellers on Taobao, they order wholesale amounts, then decant into little jars, tubs, pots, bottles and baggies and resell.
So if I see the only shop that sells fragrance oils from America and they have an awesome new fragrance oil from NDA, I don’t need to buy a whole bottle of it. I can spend 1-2rmb for 2mL so I can get a whiff of it and make enough lotion to try it out in. But, when you run out of say ewax, you contact the closet seller on Taobao and they already have all their ewax in 5g little baggies… I’m screwed.
I adore my little baggies of stuff! They rule my world!!! And I just realised you’re making references to drugs. I so need out of China!
Lol 😀 It sounds a great way of trying giodies out before buying 250g plus of something you may not use Penny. Shame we don’t do it here. I get news letters from Brambleberry and they have some lovely sounding fragrances that we don’t get here, and their EO’s are a great price, but they can’t be shipped abroad because of the flashpoint 🙁
When you have a kilo of anything, I think your feet can partake LOL 😛 I think we definitely share some brain wavelengths!
Sounds wonderful! Thank you
Thanks, Claudia! Happy making 🙂
Just made this and I love it! I substituted in this first batch powdered dry cow milk (but have coconut milk on order) for the next batch. Yesterday I didn’t read your directions for use and put it directly on my skin. It was a wee bit scrubby, but I could see that being helpful for gentle exfoliation! Tonight when I washed my face I read your directions for use and wow! the milk melted luxuriously in my palms before I applied it to my face. It was so nice.
Thanks Marie for creating such a lovely formula!
I love how you found two different ways to use it depending on what you are looking for 🙂 Thanks for DIYing with me, and happy making 🙂
Can I swap the coconut powder for something else? We don’t have this fancy coconut powder in NZ…
I just dried organic goatsmilk for the first time (to use in soaps without burning the milksugars). I haven’t found dried coconutmilk either, but gonna try a small batch with goatsmilk powder. Ill let you know how it turns out. Too bad it won’t smell like the song 🙂
Any sort of milk powder should do, but from what I remember of NZ, I bet you do have it! Check the Asian/Thai part of the grocery store. I remember being able to get halloumi and Thai curry pastes in the tiniest little towns in NZ when it’s hard to find in big markets here, so it seems like you guys have awesome grocery store selection for Middle Eastern and Asian yummies 🙂
Hi Marie, Love your site and the recipes. I’ve tried many of them and they have all worked out beautifully. This one, not so much. I did use emulsimulse but I thought it would create a similar result, maybe just thicker or thinner which is no biggy but I ended up with a bunch of oil and “cooked” milk chunks. I didn’t leave it too long and the water wasn’t boiling. I’m not sure what happened. Maybe it just doesn’t work with emulsimulse. Your Mint Julep cleansing oil is WONDERFUL if anyone is looking for a very gentle face cleanser. I use it without the EO as I have very sensitive skin.
Hmmm, how odd? Did you use the coconut milk powder? I ask because the powder can’t absorb anything in this cleansing oil, so they shouldn’t really cool or chunk up. Hmmm :/
I’m sure I used coconut milk powder…I was making your coconut mango bath bombs (so good BTW). It was a very weird outcome – the blobs, not the bombs, lol. Not to worry though, I’ll try again and see what happens. Thanks again for such great recipes. I’m glad that you are creating such smart recipes, combining natural with innovative smart additions – like sugar scrubs with emulsifiers so there less chance of a greasy tub! I look forward to all of your creations!
How odd indeed! Mine definitely has bits of undissolved milk powder in varying sizes as I neglected the coffee grinder step, but nothing full on blob-y. Mine dissolve in water once I start using it, too.
While I’m glad you’re enjoying the smart combos, I certainly can’t take credit for all of them! Emulsified sugar scrubs have been around for quite a while, I’m just enjoying sharing my take on them 🙂
Hi Abigail,
Did you try in the grocery store or food store? I got mine by the powdered milk in one shop and by the natural, organic food products in another.
hi marie
thanks for your recipe. what kind of emulator can I use instead of 20g | 0.71oz complete emulsifying wax (not beeswax! I used emulsifying wax NF). I do not know emulsify wax. is it Emulsion or Montanov (TM) L?
thanks for your reply.
best, yola
Hey Yola! Check out this post to learn more about e-waxes. I’ve never heard of the products you mentioned, so check the INCIs against the INCIs listed in the linked article 🙂
Hi Marie! I finally did some cosmetic chemistry work after a month’s break (the summer slowed down my cream consumption, and I still have a lot of stock) but luckily I ran out of facial cleansers so yay, I fell for your awesome lime coconut idea…. Except for I botched it up lovingly, and it turned into a soft balm, like Eve Lom consistency with coconut – lime fragrance and excellent performance.
Coconut oil 15
Castor oil 15
Emulsifying wax NF 20
Safflower oil 49
Vitamin E 0,5
Lime EO 0,5
These are percentages, or grams to make 100g of cleansing balm.
Awesome! What a happy accident from the sounds of it 😀 Thanks for sharing 🙂
Hi there, I was wondering if you know the pros and cons of using a cleansing oil like this on the hair?
Er… I don’t know. I’m inclined to think it would make hair dirtier, not cleaner, but I haven’t tried it. Let me know if you do!
Hi Marie,
Thanks for sharing this recipe!
You mention that it is quite thick… I’m wondering if it is thick enough to perhaps put in a jar and suspend some jojoba beads for exfoliation. What do you think?
Thanks.
I wouldn’t call it thick enough for a jar, and I do find the coconut milk powder to be pretty exfoliating on its own (it doesn’t dissolve instantaneously), so I wouldn’t recommend adding any additional exfoliants 🙂
Hey! I love the website and all the info on soap making! I am a complete newbie in soapmaking n it’s really hard for me to get cheap olive oil here n it’s not within my budget at the moment coz we don’t really use much of it here in India but if u don’t mind me asking is there a soap recipe using only coconut oil and castor oil maybe vegetable oil too? I can’t really find a recipe online they use tons of other stuff like Shea butter lard etc hopefully I get a reply 🙂 thanks in advance!
I’m not really sure what this has to do with this lime cleansing oil, but if you want to create your own soap recipe from ingredients you have access to I’d recommend using SoapCalc. Select ingredients you have access to, enter some percentages to total 100, and see what the values for hardness/lather/etc. come out at. Tweak from there and then make something!
sounds lovely – is this safe for eye makeup removal?
thanks
I’d probably leave on the essential oils for eye makeup removal, but beyond that, yes 🙂
I tried this recipe without the coconut milk powder. I substituted it with oil but after a few hours of making the cleansing oil i can see the e wax settling down in the bottle . I hv to shake everytime before using it. Is it normal ?
Hello MJ,
I need more information with your entire formula/recipe to help you out here. Let me know so I can help you further!