Ok - here is a basic recipe as a starting point. It gives the chance to have a try at making soap from scratch that can be rebatched using your melt and pour type recipe or even experiement adding essential oils, herbs, honey etc. after tracing if wishing to have a go:
Basic One
Don?t be put off that this one uses lard - it is cheap and easily available. It also makes a lovely creamy white soap with soft big bubbles when you wash with it. It can smell a little fatty so worth adding some essential oils.
454g lard
57g sodium hydroxide
142g spring water
You will need a decent old pan, a measuring jug, two large jam type thermometer to measure temp of two main bits at the same time, rubber gloves, eye goggles are good, wooden spoon, time, peace and quiet.
Place the fat in stainless steel or enamel pan over low heat unti melted. Turn off heat and watch until oils reach 130 F, stirring now and again, careful no splashing..
Weigh out sodium Hydroxide and water. Carefully pour in SH crystals into the water - use gloves, pref. eye mask as this can be VERY DANGEROUS, careful with fumes, no children around etc. Leave until temperature settles at 130F - when temps match combine the solution with the fats. This bit of getting equal temps can be a bit hectic so I usually rope in DH at this point to keep an eye on my oils while I do this fun science bit wit the caustic soda.
Stir until it all thicken and you can trickle soap off the back of a spoon - like jam making - this is called the trace point.
Add any oils, herbs etc. you wish now
Stir and pour into a greased mould of your choice.
Cover loosely with an old cloth and set for 24 hours/until hard
Cut into pieces (slightly larger than you want as it tends to shrink over the next few weeks)
Leave in cool dry place for 4 weeks to cure
Enjoy.
Now the fun bit - instead of distilled water, experiment with other liquids such as herbal teas made with the spring water (use spring water to avoid chemical imbalance with har/soft water). Try adding oatmeal for a scrub like bar. How about dividing the mixture into two and adding oatmeal to the bottom layer for a crubby side and herbs to the top for patterning..
You can see how it is open to variation.
Next think about the fat - not many of us really like using the lard, despite advantages that it does make an easy, cheap and basic soap - being white it is great for adapting. However, palm oil, coconut oil, vegetable fat, olive oil are all lovely. They all need different amounts of sodium hydroxide to saponify so no good just switching one for another -you need to get a decent saponification chart, easily found on the net - just google "saponification chart" I guess
Here is my favourite soap - dreamy, creamy, lovely:
277g veg fat
340g olive oil (low grade, not expensive stuff)
340g sunflower oil
57g beeswax
283g fresh goats milk
127g sodium hydroxide
15g ylang-ylang essential oil (or choose your own combo)
I use yoghurt pots for this one as my mould (muller light ones!)
Grease moulds, melt the fats and beeswax. This time add sodiium hydrxide with the milk. Get both fats/beeswax and the other bowl of milk and SH at 120F and then combine. Stir for ages and ages till trace - I put the radio on and chill out for around an hour..Once tracing, add the essential oil, stir well to mix and pour into moulds, same as last time.
For other, better explained recipes there are loads and loads of books and websites out there. I started after I visited Lush in Carnaby Street for the first time, then rushed out and bought Melinda Cross?s book "The handmade Soap", worked my way through many of her books, researched some more and experiements with my own wacky combinations using all sorts of bizarre ingredients to try to preserve them. I felt like a medieval "witch" going into herbal shops asking for "orris root" and red oxide etc, collecting young nettles from the woods...
I bought big cans of cheap olive oil from the local Asian foodstore - the lower grade the better for soap making, don?t waste extra virgin oil on it, the bulkier ones are better and cheaper.
Hmmm - maybe I should get back into it again, it was good fun