Coconut Oil

Coconut Oil is usually expeller-pressed from the meat of Coconuts. This is a solid at room temperature oil that has a very strong cleansing ability from its high Lauric Acid content. When Coconut Oil is used to make soap the Bar will be very hard and bubble easily, however since it dissolves well in water and cleans very well the soap made from high amounts of Coconut Oil can be very drying on the skin.
Coconut Oil when used in high amounts tends to not last very long in the shower due to its ability to clean so well. Ive also found that using oils with very high Lauric Acid but low Oleic Acid tend to produce a very drying bar. When I use a large amount of Coconut Oil (over 20%) I’ll usually increase the super fat value of the soap by 1% for every 5% additional Coconut Oil I use in the recipe. So lets say we normally do 5% Super Fat in the standard beginner recipe, If i wanted to make a bar of soap with 50% Coconut Oil in it I would raise the Super Fat by 6%, and use a recipe with 11% Super Fat instead to counteract the dryness of the soap. Remember these are just guideline that I use when I make soap and its worked well for me.

There are a multitude of different Coconut Oil you can find online or at a local grocery store. Typically unrefined Coconut oil is Solid at room temperature and has a melting point of around 76°F. You may also find Coconut Oil that has melting points of around 96°F or higher depending on how hydrogenated the oil is. They all work well for Soap making. Soap made with Coconut Oil creates a large bubbly Lather that is less stable but very cleansing. If used in large quantities the soap might be very drying on the skin so as mentioned above increasing the Super Fat level is one way to counteract this. By adding more oils high in Oleic acid is in another way to reduce the dryness of soap that has a high amount of Coconut oil(25% or more). Down below is a chart to show the average fatty acid content for 76°F Coconut Oil, these percentages of free fatty acids may vary slightly.

• Fatty Acid%
• Lauric: 48%
• Linoleic: 2%
• Linolenic: <0.1%
• Myrithic: 19%
• Oleic: 8%
• Palmitic: 9%
• Ricinolic: 0%
• Stearic: 3%