Making soap that smells sweet enough to eat!

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Project by Sharon Kinnier from Baltimore.

Sharon started making her own soap after she realized what ingredients were generally included in the store-bought variety. After much tinkering, she has created a chocolate soap that looks good enough to eat!

Materials:

2 stainless steel pots
scale
2 measuring cups
lye
goggles
surgical mask
gloves
water pitcher
immersion blender
cellophane
2 thermometers
craft sticks
freezer paper
soap mold
old clothes
oils: 40 oz. olive oil, 16 oz. coconut oil, 16 oz. palm oil
8 oz. of shea butter8 oz. of cocoa butter12 oz. lye crystals24-26 oz. water
6 oz. cocoa powder

Steps:
1. Lay out all soap making utensils. Line mold with freezer paper.
2. Measure out any herbs or additives and place nearby.
3. Dissolve lye into pitcher of ice and water and stir.
4. Weigh out hard fats into stainless steel pot. Place pot onto stove and melt fats.
5. Once hard fats are melted, put pot back on scale and measure in remaining oils. Mix.
6. Pour off 16 oz. oil into separate bowl. Mix cocoa powder into this bowl and blend well; set aside.
7. When lye solution and pot of oils are both near 110 F degrees, stir lye solution into pot. Blend with immersion blender; alternate with power on and power off, stirring as if with a spoon.
8. Stir until soap mixture reaches "trace" stage, like thin to medium pudding.
9. Stir in additives, fragrance, or essential oils.
10. Pour into mold.
11. Drizzle the cocoa powder/oils mixture into soap in mold following a vertical pattern up and down.
12. Drag a craft stick throughout the soap, evenly dispersing the chocolate throughout the mold in a marbling pattern.
13. Set the mold aside in a box and cover with another box.
14. When soap shows signs of cooling by becoming opaque at the edges, place a heavy towel over the whole mold to keep warm.

Website: www.Botanicalworks.com
E-mail: skinnier@botanicalworks.com