Good morning and Happy October! As much as I’m excited for Fall and a new slower season, I absolutely want to relish in these last few days above 70 degrees. While trying to finish up my harvests from this year, I found myself with a lot of dried Calendula in need of somewhere to go other than one of my 1,000 drying stations around my house.
That’s how this Gardener’s Lemon Calendula Soap was created. My last farewell to summer, the lemon gives an uplifting, summer scent, the chia seeds add exfoliation, and the Calendula petals are for skin healing.
What is Calendula?
Calendula is scientifically from the Asteraceae/Compositae family, simple it’s an excellent little yellow and orange gem that most hobby gardeners should have in their gardens. Anti-inflammatory and Anti-microbial, a sweet little flower that packs a punch for the natural remedy seekers.
Calendula petals are abundant with flavonoids said to have anti-inflammatory, antidiabetic, and anticancer effects. The calendula flowers are edible and add for a spruce on your daily salads.
Calendula flowers are the perfect remedy to skin irritations, and wounds which is how I ended up dousing my homemaded soap with the dried calendula petals.
Also known as
- Calendule
- English Garden Marigold
- Scotch Marigold
- Fleur de Calendule
Lemon essential Oil not only helps liven your mood with uplifting citrus scents, but it also has it’s medicinal benefits as well.
Lemon essential oil is a source of numerous therapeutic properties which include some of the following:
• Antiseptic
• Anti-rheumatic
• Antimicrobial
• Insecticidal
Now that I’m getting the hang of soap making, I find that with my bountiful supply of fresh goats milk, I’ve been trying different soap creations daily. This soap bar might be one of my favorites so far. It’s silky, lightly scented, the chia seeds add a light exfoliation, and dried Calendula petals have skin healing properties as well as adding a little visual spruce up to the bar of soap.
My hands are tired, dry, and cracked from always working outside this moisturizing gentle soap recipe is definitely one of my favorites, and it’s pretty simple to make.
Gardener’s Lemon Calendula Soap
Equipment Needed:
(I keep all my supplies for soap making separate from my regular kitchen tools, soap making no matter how well you clean the oils and lye mixture seem to leave a residue on all the things)
- kitchen scale
- measuring spoons
- glass bowls
- large spoon
- large stainless steel pot
- thermometer
- mold
- parchment paper
- stick blender
- rubber spatula
Ingredients:
8 ounces filtered water
4 ounces goat milk
10 ounces avocado oil
8 ounces lard or tallow (Tallow is simple to make on your own, and adds even more natural ingredients to your soap bars.)
8 ounces coconut oil
4 ounces grapeseed oil
2 ounces beeswax
4 ounces lye
1 ounce lemon essential oil
2 tsps chia seeds
A Handful of dried Calendula Flowers
Prep Ahead of Time
Combine the water and the goat milk in a large glass. Place the jar into the freezer for at least 2 hours before using. The slush helps prevent the lye from burning the milk resulting in a yellow, brown color.
- Heat your oils and fats together. I usually start this about an hour after my milk/lye mixture has been mixing. If you choose to start them at the same time, you can always place one in an ice beath to quickly cool it to the temperature needed.
- Mix the Lye and milk/water. This you want to do slowly, I sprinkle about a half teaspoon of lye into the milk mixture, stir and leave to set for about 20-30 minutes before I continue to add more lye to the milk mixture. Note the lye mixture always gets poured into the milk. Repeat until the lye has been completely dissolved into the milk and water.
- Prepare your mold, I like to have all my stuff setup in a production line so I don’t forget an ingredient.
- Combine and bring soap to trace when both the oils and the lye milk are 90 degrees to 100 degrees. Just in this range it doesn’t have to be exact. Use a stick blender to mix for 1 to 2 minutes and then let the mixture rest, repeat this until you reach a light trace.
- This is when you mix the lemon essential oil and chia seeds and blend for about 30-45 seconds. You can absolutely blend this by hand my first batch I used a whisk and was able to get the soap to come to trace it just took me a really long time but it’s definitely possible if you don’t have an immersion blender or hand mixer.
- Pour the soap mixture into the mold. Cover with a piece of parchment paper and set somewhere to cure. I don’t insulate my soaps often because our house is usually over 75 degrees most days, but if yours dips below that you will want to insulate the sides of the mold using a kitchen towel or something similar.
- After a couple hours I sprinkle the Calendula flower petals on top of the soap and gently press them in. Interesting fact the saponification process turns most flowers and herbs a brownish and sometimes black color, except for Calendula flowers they are fine to throw directly into this soap recipe.
- After the 12-24 hours have passed for the soap to set up take out your soap from the soap mold and cut as your heart desires. If your soap isn’t the desired firmness you can leave it to cure in the mold a little longer.
After cutting my soap I leave it on the dryer to cure. My house isn’t enormous, so my drying stations seem to be in random areas out of the way, my soap drying station currently sits atop my dryer for the first week, then moves to a laundry shelf for the remaining weeks to cure.
You can make this recipe even more simple by buying a pre-made melt and pour soap base. I haven’t tried it, but it seems very simple, and less intensive as the cold processing soap. (This simply means one is premixed for you, the other means you mix it all yourself) I find that I enjoy putting on my soap making gear, and mixing all the things together it’s a very therapeutic hobby. Cold processed soaps give you a higher price for your soap making business!
Have you made your own soap before? Do you have a favorite scent you love?
Happy soap making!
Danielle
