Colored Milk research results

First a Word on Methodology  

Whenever I make milk soap I always use CP or cold process with the following exceptions. First I freeze the milk I am using in place of water. My test recipes always have 16 oz of oils.

_IF_ I am using a colorant that needs to be dispersed in water I freeze one ounce less of the milk and use that one ounce to disperse my colorant. I use a small whisk to mix. This is added to the oils just before I add the lye-milk mixture. FO gets added to the oils before I start on the lye-milk mixture.

The only really tricky part is knowing when the lye is completely disolved. I generally stir until either the mixture starts to turn a creamy yellow or just stir 2 or 3 minutes. Next I pour the lye-milk mixture through a very fine sieve. It won't hurt the soap if you don't, but you will have white blobs of coagulated protein in it. Occasionally you will find small hard lumps in the sieve. I don't know what they are, but this doesn't seem to hurt the soap.

Next the soap goes into the freezer for at least 1/2 hour. ALWAYS in a tray mold covered with plastic. This seems to eliminate the problem of ash. A log mold will not work. Milk soap that is too warm during the saponifacation process will turn tan or even brown. This may muddy your pretty colors.

Lastly, the soap gets at least 4 hours in the fridge still covered.

A final note. DO NOT try to cut for at least 24 hours. Milk soap tends to be sticky and hard to handle for at least that long.  
 

Milk Soap colored with FD&C lake colors posted Dec 4,2008

Over the last 3 months I have been testing the FD&C lake powdered colorants with my colorant2 milk soap recipe. As you can see from the picture above you CAN make relatively pretty milk soap with them. For this round of experiments I used fat free powered milk reconstitued following instructions on the box.

I tested red, yellow and blue, with some mixing to create orange and green. There are a few problems with these colors. They do not disperse well in either water or oil, although they do better in water. They also tend to leave colored spots in the soap. Blue is the worst offender, but all the colors I tested do spot. The blue and the yellow remain true. Red however comes out a orangeish hue when I used a smaller quantity in an attempt to create a light pink. Yellow and red mixed 3 to 1 to make orange comes out an off orange. It is actually hard to tell from a light red trying to be a pink.

Lesson learned. These colorants do make pretty soap most of the time. But I can't recommend them to anyone planning to sell soap. There are better options out there.

Next I will be testing the oxides. Since they tend to behaive better in soap made with all water we should get better results with milk soap too. So, stay tuned. The great color journey has just begun.

Milk Soap colored with FD&C lake colors posted Jan 15, 2009

Today I got out all the test bars of FD&C colorants 1 - 2 months old. The results are interesting. Overall the colors are for the most part ok. The tendancy though is to be not as bright as the some amounts in the same recipe minus the milk. I've also reported on brown oxide (I did that one for Christmas presents), a gold mica, Neon yellow, Neon Purple, and Pop Grape out of order. These may get repeated.  
FD&C red lake nice batches vary from light to dark pink at least one is a dark red  
Gold mica one batch dark yellow one light yellow  
FD&C yellow #6 batches vary from light to medium yellow  
Neon yellow nice light yellow  
½ FD&C blue and ½ FD&C yellow nice dark green  
FD&C blue mixed results with no milk it's lavender one batch of milk soap is tan, the other batch which was blue earlier is now a dark lavender  
3 parts FD&C red to 1 part FD&C yellow makes an orange-pink  
Brown oxide is more of a caramel than a brown  
Lavender oxide makes a bluish lavender  
Grape pop makes dull reddish lavender  
Neon purple made a light tan    

Milk Soap colored with oxides posted Feb 25, 2009

The begining of Janurary found me in the middle of a search for the best way to get a nice purple color for a dear soaper friend of mine. So we will pick up there.  A mixture of Kolourscape red and blue netted me a nice pinkish purple. Easter purple, a lab color was ultimately the winner. It made a nice dark rich purple. A smaller amount of the Easter purple produces a lighter lavender purple, a bit more to my taste.   Neon purple bombed out. It produced a light bluish pink, a nice color but not what I was looking for. Burgandy oxide makes a nice bluish purple.   Yellow oxide produces a yellow that is a tad bit on the dull side. Still its a light subtle color that goes well with floral fragrances.   Red oxide produces light purple or a lighter pinkish purple depending on the amount you use.   Ulramarine produces a turquoise blue or a dark sky blue depending on the amount you use.   Violet oxide was a disappointment. It produced a light and a dark lavender that got really dull over time.   The green oxide was wonderful. It has maintained a delightful shade of light green.   Overall the oxides are good choices for milk soaps. Most of the shades I tested will produce two or more colors depending on the amount you use. They disperse well in both water and oil, making them easy to incorperate at any stage of the soapmaking process.  

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