06 January 2015

Chocolate Covered Strawberry Hand Milled (Rebatched) Soap Recipe

Turn hotel soap or any other soap into adorable chocolate covered strawberry rebatched soaps.  

I always think of Valentine's Day when I see a chocolate covered strawberry.  I'm not sure why because I've never made them for Valentine's Day.  Hubby, if you are reading this, get me some, k?

Speaking of chocolate covered strawberries, have you ever soaked them in whipped cream vodka before dipping them?  You really should.  You're welcome.

Back to the soap recipe.  I like making soap, but I don't want to make 432 bars in one batch or buy a ton of ingredients.   That's why I picked this recipe for hand milled or rebatched soap.  It uses premade soap, so I get all the benefits of the soap without making it myself.  Awesome!


Making soap without lye is a lot easier because you have to be very careful with lye.  Of course, the premade bars still have lye in them, but it's already been neutralized.  So you get to have fun making soap without working with chemicals.

A higher quality bar will yield higher quality soap.  I don't recommend using soap from the dollar store or other cheap soap for this hand milled soap recipe.  You'll want a quality bar even when making soap without lye, so start with a quality bar.
I decided to make chocolate and strawberry soap, but you can make any scent or color that you want!  At the end of the recipe, I'll tell you how to make it all one scent.

Chocolate Covered Strawberry Hand Milled Soap Recipe


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I used small hotel soap samples.  My neighbor travels a lot and brings me back several bars each time he stays in a hotel.
For those wondering, he does request that they not leave more soap, but they sometimes do anyway.  He could be in a hotel up to six months at a time, so it really adds up.


These hotel soaps are rather dry.  It's best to use a handmade bar of soap.  If you don't make soap, try getting some on Etsy.  I recommend getting a bar of castile soap because it's fairly gentle.

You can also use your handmade bastile soap recipe to make these bars.

INGREDIENTS

DIRECTIONS


STEP #1


You can grate your soap with a cheese grater, but I don't mind bigger chunks and my poor hands can't grate that much anymore.  I cut mine with a knife.

I got big chunks, powder, and everything in between.  You can see some of the chunks in the final bars, but I like the look.  If you want a more uniform look, then you'll want to grate it.

My soap was dry, so it more or less crumbled when I cut it.  If you're using handmade soap, it won't crumble as much.


STEP #2


Set up your double boiler and add the grated soap and 1/2 cup distilled water or coconut milk.  I used distilled water because I like to keep it easy.


STEP #3


Heat over medium low heat until the soap starts to melt.  This is a good time to clean up your soap grating or cutting mess.

I let mine go for half an hour before I turned it up to medium.  I stirred it a few times, but it didn't want to melt.  I used a very dry soap, so I added extra water a tablespoon at at time.  When it looked like it was a runny glob of soap, I tuned off the heat.



STEP #4


Divide the soap in to two bowls.  I did half in each bowl, but you can do 1:3 or whatever you want.

STEP #5


Add 10 drops strawberry essential oil and 1-2 drops pink coloring to one bowl.  My soap had cooled off at this point, so I mixed it with my hands.


STEP #6


Add 1 teaspoon cocoa powder to the other bowl.  Again, I just used my hands because it was easier and the soap was starting to set up by then.

STEP #7


Use your hands to press the pink strawberry soap in to the bottom half of a soap mold.  You want to firmly press it down so there aren't any air pockets.

STEP #8 


Now do the same thing to add the chocolate layer on top.  Be careful not to press too hard though because you could force the chocolate layer in to the strawberry layer.


STEP #9


Let sit for several hours.  Flip the mold over and remove the soap.  If it doesn't pop out easily, let it sit longer.

Let dry on a cooling rack until all the excess water has evaporated.  This can take a few days depending on how much water you added.

It's hard to see the rack on my black stovetop.  I used my cookie cooling racks from Wilton.

Ta da!  Now you have these adorable chocolate covered strawberry hand milled or rebatched soaps!





This recipe is very easy to adapt.  For each 2 cups of grated soap flakes, add 20 drops of fragrance oil.  You can also add 1 tablespoon of an additive like oatmeal.

To make it all chocolate, add 1.5-2 teaspoons of chocolate cocoa powder.  The cocoa powder has a light chocolate scent, but it's not really strong.  If you want a really strong chocolate scent, use chocolate fragrance oil.

My daughter came home from school and said it smelled like chocolate and "something else" so apparently the cocoa powder was enough of a scent for me.

Looking for more handmade soap recipes?  Try one of these:


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Let me know in the comments if you try making soap without lye with this recipe or any other recipe!