Canola Oil for Soap Recipe?

[emulkahi1]

Hi All--I had intended to try making soap today. It will be my first effort at this. I FINALLY found 100% lye and have a bunch of rendered tallow from the bison we butchered this winter. Unfortunately, I wasn't as prepared as I should have been and did not bring the recipe w/ me when we made the trip to Billings ('big city' where one can actually find different sorts of stuff). I now see that most recipes call for a mixture of olive oil w/ something like coconut or jojoba oil, and some other stuff. I have LOTS of canola oil (MIL always buys a bunch when she is in town. I have a tendency to use organic olive oil, so it stays around forever). I also have a new bottle of organic olive oil. But I don't really want to empty it for this as it was pricey and I'd planned on using it for cooking. I don't think I can find coconut or jojoba oil at our small-town grocery store. I was considering making a trip and buying some non-organic/less expensive olive oil, and then just using the canola oil. Do you think this would work out ok? I don't know much about the properties of different oils, but I know that there ARE differences, so I wanted to run it by someone that is more educated than me....before I waste all of the other ingredients in a failed attempt.

If I do need to add more types of oils, do you know of any that might be find-able here at our lil grocery store?

Another question I had.....My Mom had sent me a bunch of lavendar branches from the bush she has growing in VA. I've had them dried and hanging here in my kitchen for a while, waiting till I came up w/ a use for them. Do you think I could add lavendar to the soap?

THANK YOU for your help !!!!

Erin

[cchapman84]

You can definitely add the lavender to the soap, but it may make the soap a bit scratchy (I know this from experience).

Here's a calculator (http://www.thesage.com/calcs/lyecalc2.php) you can use to figure out how much lye to use depending on what oils and how much of each you're using. You can literally use any oil you want in soap, some will work better than others, but they'll pretty much all work. I've had great luck with plain old soybean oil believe it or not!

Good luck!

[MELOC]

if you are near a walmart, they may have coconut oil. that would be a good addition.

[halfpint]

If you're going to use the tallow, I would think a mixture of tallow and canola oil would work. I don't use canola oil though, so don't know about the properties.

Dawn

[emulkahi1]

Ok, great!! Thank you all for your input. I'll give the tallow and canola oil a shot and see how it turns out. It was so nice out there today (mid-50's and sunny, in MT in Feb!!) that I just couldn't make myself stay inside the kitchen, so I am going to actually make a go of it tomorrow instead. I was just afraid that some particular type of oil would be required to get the bars to set up or something. I'll post and let ya'll know how it goes ! Thanks again.....

Erin

[Charleen]

Yes, you can add the lavendar but it will not retain the color in CP soap. It will not survive saponification, the lav buds will turn black and appear as mouse turds. But in HP, they can be added after cooking and should retain color. Don't expect it to add any scent though. Your best bet is to add lavender EO for scent.

Yes, you can use canola oil but you just can't sub one oil for another without running your recipe through a lye calculator such as The Soap Calc and determining if the amount of lye needs to be adjusted.

http://www.soapcalc.com/


Have fun!