Introduction: Rustic Exfoliating Soap Cakes
About: Just a local Texas native passionate about skincare products.
I really dislike using scrubs in jars.
When you’re showering, you get water in the scrub, which consistently grosses me out. Some of them have a greasy consistency and make your skin feel like you just dipped your body in body oil. However, due to my chronic dry elbows and knees, they are an absolute necessity for me. No matter how much lotion, creams, butters I pack on, they always end up ashy at the end of the day. The only way I can alleviate the ashiness is by using a scrub.
This is why I created this easy recipe to make.
You get the advantage of a cleansing soap, and great exfoliation.
I also use these for my hands after I have been gardening. They’re great at getting dirt out from under your nails!
Warning: After using this, I strongly encourage you to moisturize. This is primarily formulated for cleansing and exfoliating properties. Please remember that whenever you use a scrub, you run the risk of causing micro tears in your skin!
When you’re showering, you get water in the scrub, which consistently grosses me out. Some of them have a greasy consistency and make your skin feel like you just dipped your body in body oil. However, due to my chronic dry elbows and knees, they are an absolute necessity for me. No matter how much lotion, creams, butters I pack on, they always end up ashy at the end of the day. The only way I can alleviate the ashiness is by using a scrub.
This is why I created this easy recipe to make.
You get the advantage of a cleansing soap, and great exfoliation.
I also use these for my hands after I have been gardening. They’re great at getting dirt out from under your nails!
Warning: After using this, I strongly encourage you to moisturize. This is primarily formulated for cleansing and exfoliating properties. Please remember that whenever you use a scrub, you run the risk of causing micro tears in your skin!
Supplies
Dry Ingredients:
330g of Fine Himalayan Pink Salt
48g of Colloidal Oatmeal
14g of Bentonite Clay (optional)
Wet Ingredients:
2g of Lavender Essential Oil (Optional)
5g of Fragrance
4g of Decyl Glucoside (Optional)
6.6g of Grapeseed Oil (Interchangeable)
Heat Phase Ingredients:
330g of Melt and Pour Soap
Tools:
Gloves
Mixer with Dough Attachment (Optional)
Stir Stick
Microwaveable Bowl
Mixing Bowls (2)
1 mold (I used a 24 count square mold because it makes perfect mini cakes for roughly one time use!)
1 plastic sandwich bag
1 thermostat
Step 1: Understanding Your Ingredients and Allocating Them
Understanding what your ingredients do is really important when you first start making bath and body products. A few of these ingredients are interchangeable, or optional. I based a lot of additive percentages on the melt and pour alone versus the weight of the total product. Typically the maximum amount of additives you want to put in melt and pour is roughly 5%, but your mileage may very depending on the melt and pour manufacturer.
I will also tell you where I purchased my ingredients!
Himalayan Pink Salt: I chose this because you can get a great deal on it at Dollar Tree or Big Lots. It is a harsher exfoliator, but that’s exactly what I want.
Melt and Pour Soap: There are a million melt and pour soaps out there. I chose this base because:
A. It was easy to purchase. (They stock it at Michael’s.)
B: I’ve worked with this melt and pour before.
C. It’s palm-free and has a nice lather.
There are some really great melt and pours on Etsy too if you are looking for a simpler ingredient list and you would be supporting a small business.
Colloidal Oatmeal: I added this because it offers some soothing properties to offset the exfoliation, and it helps enhance the doughy texture when you start molding. I also purchase this at the Dollar Tree for a great deal.
Bentonite Clay: This is optional and interchangeable. This additive helps increase slippage of the soap and has some great purifying properties. You can swap this out with another clay or more colloidal oatmeal. The brand I am using for this can be found at Target.
Grapeseed Oil: This is interchangeable. Personally I prefer to add castor oil to my melt and pour recipes because it enhances the bubbles, but alas, I am out. I always keep Grapeseed Oil on hand because of its non-comedogenic properties (it doesn’t clog your pores) and because it is a great moisturizer. It doesn’t get used a lot by most beauty brands because of its short shelf-life (six months to a year), but for me the benefits outweighed the disadvantages. Most skin care products lose a lot of efficacy in that time frame anyway. I also purchased this at Target, but sometimes you can get lucky and find it at Dollar Tree as well.
Lavender Essential Oil: This is optional. I added it because I like the way it mixes with my fragrance (avobath dupe) and again because it does offer a measure of soothing properties to the bars. Woolzies is one of my favorite essential oil brands and you can check them out on Amazon or their website.
Fragrance: This is optional. I used an avobath dupe I purchased from a destash group that smells absolutely divine when mixed with lavender oil. This is definitely one of my favorite blends! I do typically purchase my fragrances from Fragrance Buddy, Candle Science, or Misty’s Magical Supplies.
Decyl Glucoside: This is optional. This is a fairly gentle liquid surfactant that I added to enhance the soapy properties. I purchased this from Bath Divas- an excellent small business supply company with a ton of cool stuff!
Scale: It’s imperative that you use a scale that measures at least to the hundredth degree to maintain ingredient accuracy, if you want to avoid accidentally causing irritants or if you plan on selling. My scale is pretty basic, and I typically use it for my larger scale ingredients only because of it. I use a smaller scale to measure out my wet ingredients to maintain accuracy. I purchased both of mine from Amazon, but sometimes eBay has better deals!
I will also tell you where I purchased my ingredients!
Himalayan Pink Salt: I chose this because you can get a great deal on it at Dollar Tree or Big Lots. It is a harsher exfoliator, but that’s exactly what I want.
Melt and Pour Soap: There are a million melt and pour soaps out there. I chose this base because:
A. It was easy to purchase. (They stock it at Michael’s.)
B: I’ve worked with this melt and pour before.
C. It’s palm-free and has a nice lather.
There are some really great melt and pours on Etsy too if you are looking for a simpler ingredient list and you would be supporting a small business.
Colloidal Oatmeal: I added this because it offers some soothing properties to offset the exfoliation, and it helps enhance the doughy texture when you start molding. I also purchase this at the Dollar Tree for a great deal.
Bentonite Clay: This is optional and interchangeable. This additive helps increase slippage of the soap and has some great purifying properties. You can swap this out with another clay or more colloidal oatmeal. The brand I am using for this can be found at Target.
Grapeseed Oil: This is interchangeable. Personally I prefer to add castor oil to my melt and pour recipes because it enhances the bubbles, but alas, I am out. I always keep Grapeseed Oil on hand because of its non-comedogenic properties (it doesn’t clog your pores) and because it is a great moisturizer. It doesn’t get used a lot by most beauty brands because of its short shelf-life (six months to a year), but for me the benefits outweighed the disadvantages. Most skin care products lose a lot of efficacy in that time frame anyway. I also purchased this at Target, but sometimes you can get lucky and find it at Dollar Tree as well.
Lavender Essential Oil: This is optional. I added it because I like the way it mixes with my fragrance (avobath dupe) and again because it does offer a measure of soothing properties to the bars. Woolzies is one of my favorite essential oil brands and you can check them out on Amazon or their website.
Fragrance: This is optional. I used an avobath dupe I purchased from a destash group that smells absolutely divine when mixed with lavender oil. This is definitely one of my favorite blends! I do typically purchase my fragrances from Fragrance Buddy, Candle Science, or Misty’s Magical Supplies.
Decyl Glucoside: This is optional. This is a fairly gentle liquid surfactant that I added to enhance the soapy properties. I purchased this from Bath Divas- an excellent small business supply company with a ton of cool stuff!
Scale: It’s imperative that you use a scale that measures at least to the hundredth degree to maintain ingredient accuracy, if you want to avoid accidentally causing irritants or if you plan on selling. My scale is pretty basic, and I typically use it for my larger scale ingredients only because of it. I use a smaller scale to measure out my wet ingredients to maintain accuracy. I purchased both of mine from Amazon, but sometimes eBay has better deals!
Step 2: Dry Ingredients
Carefully measure out your dry ingredients- so the Himalayan pink salt, colloidal oatmeal, and the bentonite clay. Throughly mix them together in a mixing bowl. I purchased these pretty decently sized mixing bowls from the Dollar Tree.
Step 3: Wet Ingredients
Weigh and combine the wet ingredients in a small mixing bowl as well. Stir them thoroughly. There may appear to be some separation, but don’t worry too much about it, as long as it’s mostly mixed. You’re about to throw this into the melt and pour soap.
Step 4: Heat Phase
Heat up your melt and pour soap! Back when I first started, I was very careful on how I handled my melt and pour soap. I chopped it into very fine pieces and always put it on a double boiler, but this ended up being way more of a headache than it needed to be. Work smarter, not harder!
Melting it in the microwave is totally fine. I measured what I needed, and then chopped up my melt and pour blocks to about half-inch squares.
Then I put them in a microwaveable bowl, and first ran it in for thirty second intervals. I stirred between each interval, and I only had to do this twice.
When it was mostly melted, I did a shorter interval at 20 seconds. By that point it was almost completely melted and I did one final stir that melted the rest of the tiny solid scraps.
Tip: It’s important to break up microwaving your soap. If you do it all at once, you run the risk of burning it.
Melting it in the microwave is totally fine. I measured what I needed, and then chopped up my melt and pour blocks to about half-inch squares.
Then I put them in a microwaveable bowl, and first ran it in for thirty second intervals. I stirred between each interval, and I only had to do this twice.
When it was mostly melted, I did a shorter interval at 20 seconds. By that point it was almost completely melted and I did one final stir that melted the rest of the tiny solid scraps.
Tip: It’s important to break up microwaving your soap. If you do it all at once, you run the risk of burning it.
Step 5: Mix Wet Phase With Heat Phase
You do want to make sure that your melt and pour isn’t too hot so that the oils do not break down. Flashpoint for the fragrance oil can run anywhere between 165F-175F depending on the brand. The one I’m using specifically has a higher flashpoint of 183F. As long as it’s cooler, then it will behave properly. I mixed in my wets with the melt and pour and thoroughly stirred.
Step 6: Mix in and Then Knead Dry Phase
Next I slowly mixed in the dry phase until it turns into a thick dough. Afterwards, I kneaded the rest of the mix. You can use a mixer with a dough attachment, or do this by hand. I did this by hand until everything was completely mixed.
Step 7: Mold Cakes
After all this, I hand molded the cakes in my silicone pan. The consistency of the mix should be like a dough. I press them in thoroughly into the pan until I feel like they’ve been properly smooshed. The shapes come out a little rounded, but I know for sure that the corners have been completely filled. I chose this mold because the smaller bars are more like one time use, which I prefer, though they usually last me a few days each.
Step 8: Dust With Himalayan Salt (Optional)
I really like the way these look when you dust them with salt. This is just after they harden enough to hold shape, but are still a little sticky. I grab a sandwich bag, throw some leftover salt in there and shake. They end up looking like Pan de Polvo (delicious Mexican cinnamon shortbread cookies) to me! If you switch up the ingredients and the fragrance a little, you could probably do a Pan de Polvo spin-off.
Step 9: Let Cure
It is absolutely necessary to let your melt and pour cure, but this is true even more so for this bar because of the high salt content. If you don’t you are going to get a softer bar that breaks up immediately. I like to let my Exfoliating Soapy Cakes cool in the fridge for a few hours and then cure in my office for about a week. Afterwards the bars will be a lot firmer and won’t completely disintegrate when you use them in the shower. That being said, like any handmade soap, these do best with proper drainage.
Step 10: Test, Package, Store
Here is the creamy lather I get from the soap. It can be a little drying with the salt level, so I moisturize after with some lotion.
I like to store mine in this little container I bought from dollar tree. Alternatively you can store them in mason jars. Like any handmade soaps, these hold shape best when they have proper drainage. Enjoy!