Wow, a year later with the Spud Soaps

I went back in the archives of my blog and found that I had posted concerning the problem we were having with our new molds. It was 13 months ago. Hard to believe that the time has gone by so quickly and that I have really procrastinated posting what has been the trick to getting the spud soaps, particularly the Huckleberry scented spuds, to come out just right. Here is the link to the post and pictures of what the soaps looked like out of the mold.

Original Post

Thanks to Anne-Marie at Brambleberry for her suggestions. We started insulating the molds better and we started mixing all the oils and lye water at 140 degrees. The temps were necessary for the cellini blue to properly morph to a great purple color as well as to make sure the soap gelled from one side to the other, top to bottom.

Here is a picture of the soaps in the silicon molds. If you look at the older post, you'll see where the soap looks split right from the beginning. Notice that the soap seen in the pour spout of the mold is not split:



One of the big problems with the soaps a year ago was that when being unmolded, they were difficult to remove because they would stick at various parts of the mold, and leave chunks of soaps. Now the soaps are very uniform in color and there is hardly any sticking at all. Out of about 50 molds, only one had a slight problem with sticking. Just a little quick trim on each spud to remove that top portion created by the mold's spout and the soaps are set on the drying tables for a few weeks before final cleaning and polish.



The color as seen through the camera lens is really not quite as good as seeing it in real life. The spuds are uniform in color and quality and when these are finished drying, will meet our standards for a nice quality spud shaped soap.



There was also a fellow soaper, from Australia if I remember correctly, who emailed and gave us some suggestions that fell in line with what Anne-Marie suggested. I'm terribly sorry but I had deleted your email and information. But we so appreciated the time and effort you and Anne-Marie took to help us figure out what to do to make our trademark soaps. Now that we've gotten that problem solved, Nancy is able to take time out for her favorite past time - see photo. Isn't she a TOTAL BABE! And if she sees I posted this pic, I am TOTALLY DEAD, lol.