Almond soap

Since I have been quite absent lately, I thought it would be nice to share with you how I made this really special Almond soap, formulated with what I had in hand at the moment, which turned out to be perfect for mature dry skin. The design was inspired by this beautiful log from Product Body...a nice plain bottom with a whipped top in contrasting color.

First off, I prepared almond milk to use instead of water. For this I used about four cups of water and 1 cup of almonds. I heated them on medium until they boiled, then lowered the heat and let them sit there for about an hour. After this time, I let them cool off and then hit them with my stick blender until the almonds were really mashed up.

 

I used a "state of the art" filtering system to get all my almond milk and none of the almond bits. Ladies and gentlemen...I introduce...."the sock". It's not really a sock, but it looks like one. It's what is traditionally used to brew coffe in Costa Rica. It's a very dense cotton bag which allows liquid to filter through without the grinds. It's very effective specially if it gets clogged up because you can just grab it and squish.

There is a very nifty wooden frame that goes with it but, alas, I do not have one, so I had to use a PVC pipe to hold the baggie while I poured. Once everything was filtered, I added the lye and stirred stirred stirred....it turned out more mashed potatoes than lye water, but it worked just fine.

 While all of that was going on, I cut and cleaned an aloe vera leaf and added it to the almond milk as well, for extra goodiness.

I weighed my oils, melted them and split them in two...2/3 to color with my base color - in this case a nice terracota color. And 1/3 to go uncolored for the whipped topping. I also got my fragrance ready just so I wouldn't forget (never happened before LOL).

I mixed the lye mash with the oils until trace, added fragrance and color and poured into my prepared mold. Lined with foam since I felt horrible for using so much freezer paper :( - it's actually working really well...peels off very nicely.

After about half an hour, I started with the white whipped topping. Not before noticing a nasty crack running down my terracota base :( it was really really hot that day, so it just split a little bit.

I mixed my oils with the lye and mixed until very heavy trace and added the fragrance - this bit goes without color. I sprayed my base liberaly with alcohol and poured the topping. The way it fell is the way I left it...it looked really nice :)

And here's the finished product...doesn't it look nice?? A delicious blend of olive, palm, coconut, almond and castor oil, made with almond milk and a delicious almondy fragrance. I love it!!

Now it's in the softy stage...sitting in my drying area and I'm crossing my fingers it will be ready for the next fair.

Hope you've enjoyed reading :) Next time I'll try video :)

xoxo

Irene F.