coffee Archives - Soap Queen

Creamy Coffee Melt & Pour Soap

August 24, 2018 Filed Under: Bath & Body Tutorials, Melt & Pour Soap

Coffee isn’t just for fall, but there is something about cooler temperatures that has us craving it more intensely. If you need a caffeine fix, these Creamy Coffee Melt & Pour Soaps are the perfect project.

The bars are made with Goat Milk Melt and Pour Soap Base, which has a gentle feeling on the skin. A touch of coffee seed oil is added to the melted base. It’s extracted from freshly-roasted coffee beans, so it has an intense smell and dark color. When adding extra oils or butters to melt and pour soap, we recommend about 1 teaspoon per pound of soap. If too much extra oil or butter is added, the soap may not harden properly. It can also develop a greasy feeling and have less lather.

Used coffee grounds add a bit of exfoliation. Make sure to let them dry thoroughly before use. We don’t recommend fresh grounds because they bleed in soap.

What You Need:
6 Cavity Silicone Circle Mold
22 oz. Goat Milk Melt and Pour Soap Base
1 tsp. Coffee Seed Oil
1 tsp. Used Coffee Grounds
0.4 oz. Espresso Fragrance Oil
0.4 oz. Vanilla Color Stabilizer
99% Isopropyl Alcohol in a Spray Bottle

Click below to add everything you need for this project to your Bramble Berry shopping cart!

ONE: Chop 22 oz. of Goat Milk Melt and Pour Soap Base into small uniform pieces. Place the soap into a heat-safe container and melt in the microwave using 30-60 second bursts.

TWO: Add 1 tsp. of coffee seed oil (about 0.1 oz.) to the melted base and use a spoon to thoroughly mix in. Add 0.4 oz. of Espresso Fragrance Oil and 0.4 oz. of Vanilla Color Stabilizer and mix.

THREE: Add 1 heaping tsp. of the used coffee grounds and stir in.

FOUR: Allow the soap to cool to about 120-125 degrees F. That prevents the coffee grounds from sinking to the bottom of the bars.

FIVE: Fill each mold cavity. After each pour, spritz the soap with 99% isopropyl alcohol to help get rid of bubbles. Allow the soap to cool and fully harden for several hours or up to overnight. Remove from the mold and enjoy. To prevent glycerin dew, wrap each bar in plastic wrap.

5.0 from 5 reviews

Creamy Coffee Melt & Pour Soap

Cook time

30 mins

Total time

30 mins

Author: Soap Queen

Recipe type: Melt and Pour Soap

Serves: 6 bars of soap

Ingredients

6 Cavity Silicone Circle Mold
22 oz. Goat Milk Melt and Pour Soap Base
1 tsp. Coffee Seed Oil
1 tsp. Used Coffee Grounds
0.4 oz. Espresso Fragrance Oil
0.4 oz. Vanilla Color Stabilizer
99% Isopropyl Alcohol in a Spray Bottle

Instructions

Chop 22 oz. of Goat Milk Melt and Pour Soap Base into small uniform pieces. Place the soap into a heat-safe container and melt in the microwave using 30-60 second bursts.
Add 1 tsp. of coffee seed oil (about 0.1 oz.) to the melted base and use a spoon to thoroughly mix in. Add 0.4 oz. of Espresso Fragrance Oil and 0.4 oz. of Vanilla Color Stabilizer and mix.
Add 1 heaping tsp. of the used coffee grounds and stir in.
Allow the soap to cool to about 120-125 degrees F. That prevents the coffee grounds from sinking to the bottom of the bars.
Fill each mold cavity. After each pour, spritz the soap with 99% isopropyl alcohol to help get rid of bubbles. Allow the soap to cool and fully harden for several hours or up to overnight. Remove from the mold and enjoy. To prevent glycerin dew, wrap each bar in plastic wrap.

Simple Coffee Soap DIY

July 5, 2017 Filed Under: Bath & Body Tutorials, Cold Process Soap

If you’re a coffee lover, this simple soap recipe is for you. It’s made with coffee seed oil, a dark and rich oil extracted from roasted coffee beans. Coffee seed oil has a delicious aroma. This recipe uses only 3% of it, but that’s enough to give it a light color and coffee scent.

The soap also contains used coffee grounds for exfoliation and coffee butter for extra moisture. Fresh grounds can bleed in soap, which is why used grounds are best. The liquid in this recipe is half distilled water and half brewed coffee. If you have never used coffee as the liquid in your soap before, check out our How to Make Coffee Soap post. Feel free to use all distilled water or all coffee if you prefer.

All these amazing coffee ingredients give the bars enough color and scent without any fragrance oil or colorant. That being said, the scent is very light. If you want a stronger coffee scent, Espresso Fragrance Oil would be great in this recipe. It will lightly discolor the soap.

[Read more…]

5 Tips for Using Fresh Ingredients in Soap

March 17, 2017 Filed Under: Tips & Tricks

Have you ever looked in your kitchen cabinets and thought, “Huh, I wonder if I can put that in soap?” If so, you’re in good company. It’s a pretty common thought among soapmakers. Also, you are in luck – there are plenty of fresh ingredients you can use in your cold process recipes. In addition to setting your soap apart and attracting customers, fresh ingredients add something special to your recipes. For instance, avocado gives soap a luxurious feeling. Find a roundup of recipes made with fresh ingredients here. Before getting started, there are a few things to know. The tips below will ensure your experiments turn out well so you can focus on the fun part – getting creative and trying something new!

Research Before Getting Started
Each ingredient you add to your recipe will affect how the soap performs. If you add an ingredient with natural sugar, it can cause acceleration and overheating. If you add an ingredient with a lot of liquid, it can make your batch too wet. That’s why research is important. Find out how the ingredient performs beforehand so you know what to expect and can account for any quirks. The How to Add Purees to Cold Process Soap has plenty of information to help get you started.

Honey can overheat in soap and cause discoloration and bubbles, as seen in the photo above. Learn how to work with honey here.

Buy Local
Once you decide what ingredient you want to experiment with, the next step is finding it. We recommend buying local! There are so many quality ingredients at your local stores and farmers markets. For instance, at the Farmers Market here in Bellingham, there is everything from fresh coffee to juicy blueberries. They would be an amazing addition to your recipe. Not only do you support your local economy, but you can tell your customers all about the fresh ingredients and where they come from. It’s an amazing selling point and it shows off your hometown pride.

Consider a Water Discount
To help the fresh ingredients mix in smoothly, they are often pureed with distilled water. Many fresh ingredients also contain a lot of liquid. The added water can make your soap too wet. That’s where a water discount comes in – it accounts for the extra liquid you’re adding to your batch. It also helps prevent glycerin rivers. How much water you discount from your recipe depends on the fresh ingredient. For instance, cucumber is a very watery vegetable, so a higher water discount would be helpful. A good water discount to start with is 10% and adjust from there based on the additive you choose. Learn more in the Water Discounting Cold Process Soap post.

A water discount keeps your recipe balanced.

Watch Those Temperatures
Fresh ingredients with natural sugar have the potential to overheat in cold process soap. That can cause discoloration, an unpleasant smell, heat tunnels and, worst case scenario, a soap volcano. That’s why it’s important to keep your temperatures low. Soaping around 100-110 ° F will keep things cool and give you time to work with your design. If you’re using an alternative liquid, you may want to cool or freeze it beforehand to prevent scorching. Learn more about working with coffee and tea, alcohol and milk in your soap. Once the soap is in the mold, put it in the fridge or freezer for 5-24 hours. If you’re using a fresh ingredient without natural sugar, they can still cause glycerin rivers or partial gel phase. You can leave the soap at room temperature or cool it in the freezer to be extra careful.

Milk needs to be frozen before the lye is added to keep temperatures low. Learn more in this post.

Test it Out
Whatever fresh ingredient you choose to jazz up your cold process soap, make a small test batch of your recipe. If you’ve never worked with that ingredient before it can do unpredictable things. The test batch allows you to make adjustments before making a larger batch. It’s also a great time to test the bars on your skin to see what you think. If you add avocado and the bars are too soft, you can add more hard oils like coconut and palm. If the honey overheated your batch even with cooler temperatures, you can add less next time. Before you know it, you’ll be a pro at adding random cabinet ingredients to your handmade goodies!

The Avocado + Spearmint Cold Process Soap took several tries to get just right.

What’s your favorite fresh additive for cold process soap?

How to Make Coffee Soap

March 8, 2017 Filed Under: Bath & Body Tutorials, Cold Process Soap

Here in the Pacific Northwest, we are known for our love of coffee. It’s not uncommon to have multiple Starbucks just blocks away from each other. There is also an abundant number of locally-owned coffee shops. If you love coffee as much as a Seattleite, making soap is a great way to include the ingredient in your products. In this coffee soap project, locally roasted coffee is used to really make these bars special. Using a local ingredient highlights the handmade aspect of your products.

Incorporating coffee into cold process soap is easier than you might think. The distilled water in cold process recipes can be swapped for plain coffee. The key is using distilled water to brew the coffee, and allowing the coffee to cool to room temperature before adding sodium hydroxide lye. Using coffee instead of water makes the soap batter quite dark, so keep that in mind when choosing the color palette. If you’re using plain brewed coffee, don’t worry about the soap overheating. Black coffee does not contain sugar.

Using coffee instead of water does not give soap a coffee smell. In fact, when you mix lye with coffee it does not smell very pleasant. This is because the lye “scorches” the coffee, resulting in a noticeable odor. The smell of the coffee and lye solution is usually not noticeable in the final bar. This is especially true if you’re using a fragrance oil in your recipe. For this soap, Espresso Fragrance Oil gives the bars a rich, delicious scent. Espresso Fragrance Oil does discolor in cold process soap due to the vanillin content. Titanium dioxide combats that slightly, but you can notice some discoloration on the top of the soap in the photos above and below. Learn more about vanilla discoloration here.

This soap also contains used coffee grounds. It’s important to add used rather than fresh coffee grounds. Fresh coffee grounds may bleed in the soap. The bleeding doesn’t hurt the bars in any way, but it is a cosmetic issue. It’s also a great way to use up leftover coffee grounds!

[Read more…]

How to Use Tea and Coffee in Soap

September 7, 2016 Filed Under: Tips & Tricks

Here in the Pacific Northwest, it’s starting to feel like fall. The leaves are changing, the temperatures are dropping and it’s getting dark earlier. If that wasn’t enough, Starbucks has started serving the ever-popular Pumpkin Spice Latte. There’s something so comforting about hot coffee and a warm blanket this time of year. If you’d like to translate that feeling to soap, check out the tips and tricks for incorporating coffee and tea in different ways into your recipes.

Coffee grounds
Coffee grounds add exfoliation and an interesting look in soap. They are considered a large exfoliant, meaning they will be more scrubby than something fine grained like sugar. Read more about exfoliants here. Coffee grounds are perfect for exfoliating the body, especially dry areas like feet and elbows. Used coffee grounds are best for both melt and pour and cold process soap. Dry grounds can bleed in the soap, creating a halo of color. After making a pot of coffee, place the grounds on a towel and pat dry. A general usage rate is about 1 teaspoon per pound of soap. If you want your soap scrubbier, you can add more from there.

For melt and pour soap, add the used coffee grounds to melted soap and stir well. Keep stirring until the soap is around 125-130 °F. It needs to be thick enough to suspend the coffee grounds evenly. Then, pour into your mold. The Espresso Melt and Pour Soap Bars are made with rich Espresso Fragrance Oil. In cold process soap, add the grounds at trace and whisk gently to combine. It will give your soap a lovely rustic look, as seen in the Espresso Shot Cold Process Tutorial.

Coffee grounds add exfoliation and interest to the Espresso Shot Cold Process Soap.

You can also add tea leaves or ground tea to your melt and pour and cold process soap. They can be added the same way as coffee grounds. That includes incorporating used tea leaves in your batch instead of dry, unused leaves. Make sure to pat them dry before use. Then, add the leaves and stir well. In our tests, we found the tea leaves go brown and tend to bleed in the final bars. Used tea leaves will bleed a bit less. That’s something to keep in mind when designing your soap.

[Read more…]

Bulletproof Coffee Tasting & Testing

July 12, 2015 Filed Under: Personal Ramblings

Have you heard of Bulletproof Coffee? If you haven’t, the short-version theory is that coffee can be a health food if you get beans that are organic and free of mycotoxins. Mycotoxins are a form of mold that forms when beans are in the hold of ships and wet from their voyage at sea. In the health food world, this theory is not without controversy. Some argue that this whole worry about moldy beans is simply another way to gouge coffee drinkers. Nonetheless, I’ve broken my five year no-coffee streak to try some of this supposedly new “superfood of the gods.” Bulletproof coffee drinkers start with this mycotoxin-free coffee, add MCT oil (basically, fractionated coconut oil – MCT stands for Medium Chain Triglycerides) and grass-fed-cows butter (key because grass-fed cows produce a different composition of milk than grain fed cows). The theory goes that your body can burn off the fat (rather than a sugary or carb filled breakfast), and your brain needs the fats to function optimally. I’ve been playing around with Bulletproof Coffee with and without breakfast and really like how I feel with extra fats in my diet. Like any business however, there are competitors to the Bulletproof brand of coffee that also claim to be superfoods that are low in mold.

[Read more…]

The Disneyland of Coffee & Business Takeaways

March 1, 2015 Filed Under: Business Musings

I am ridiculously lucky to live in the Pacific Northwest – and not just for the three months out of the year that it’s sunny. There are many fun things to do between Seattle and Vancouver, BC and now Seattle has the first Starbucks Reserve Roastery & Tasting Room to add to its iconic “Fun” list.

First of all, this place is the Disneyland of Coffee. It’s like a Willy Wonka set come to life, with copper coffee tubing, gorgeous wood paneling and custom lamps everywhere. It’s 15,000 square feet of luxury coffee messaging. It’s clear that it’s a Starbucks when you walk in but it’s a Starbucks that’s been upleveled, that whispers sophistication, gravitas and just begs you to walk downstairs to explore.

And downstairs is where the magic begins. Behold: the Siphon. This amazing coffee machine looks both futuristic and Jules Verne-like in its make-up. What it does produce is an amazing, $10 cup of coffee. And before you spit your homemade joe out, yes, it’s one-zero, ten, dollars for ONE cup of coffee. Would I buy it again? Yes. Was it better tasting than a Folger cup of coffee by a full 20 times? Probably. But what I’m more excited and happy to pay for is the 15 minutes of experience that goes into making, watching and tasting that coffee.

From the moment you walk into the Starbucks Reserve Roastery, everything is elevated; there is someone that greets you to tell you about the store, there are maps, there are Tom Douglas-created kale salads and there is exclusive, carefully curated non-Starbucks and Starbucks Reserve merchandise. After you wind your way through the coffee house, there are a set of oversized stairs that lead down to the actual tasting bar.

[Read more…]

Facebook Photo of the Week (May 17th ~May 23rd)

May 23, 2014 Filed Under: Bramble Berry News

This week was full of fun soapy tutorials for both melt and pour and cold process soapers. If you are experienced with melt and pour and want to learn a new technique, the Melt and Pour Soap Ribbons Tutorial is the perfect project to expand your skills. The trick is adding extra glycerin, which allows the melt and pour to be easily sculpted.

If cold process is more your style, the Espresso Shot Cold Process Tutorial uses the new Espresso Fragrance Oil to create a bar of soap that’s perfect for any coffee-lover. The layers of color are easily created with the Multi-Pour Sectioning Tool, and coffee grounds add gentle exfoliation. If you love the multi-colored sections, the Natural Colorant Taiwan Swirl Tutorial features four layers of color created with natural colorants.

Speaking of color, our Facebook Photo of the week created by Amy of The Suds Cafe, is full of bright, summery hues! Scented with the Tropical Punch Fragrance Oil and swirled with Yellow Mica, Fired Up Fuschia Colorant, Tangerine Wow! Colorant, this soap conjures images of sandy beaches, fruity drinks and lots of sunshine.

With the piped soap on top and a dusting of yellow mica, Amy’s creation is full of color and summer spirit! If you are curious about piping cold process soap, this Rose Garden Cold Process Tutorial will show you how. If you are looking for an easier way to create frosting, this Foaming Bath Whip Frosting Tutorial creates fluffy icing in a snap.

Shown above (from top, clockwise) is Amy’s Mother’s Day Strawberry Frappucino Soap, Peppermint Chocolate Frappucino Soap, Peppermint Chocolate Bar Soap, and the Cucumber Melon Smoothie Soap. If these chocolatey soaps have inspired your sweet tooth, the Chocolate Lip Balm Tutorial and Almond, Chocolate and Lavender Cold Process Tutorial are sure to satisfy.

Find The Suds Cafe:
On Etsy

Post pictures of your crafty creations on the Facebook page each week for a chance to be featured on the Soap Queen blog and receive a sweet soapy package from Bramble Berry. Photos are chosen based on consensus from the Bramble Berry staff, so the best way to increase your chances of winning is to show us lots of photos!

Espresso Shot Cold Process Tutorial

May 22, 2014 Filed Under: Cold Process Soap

It’s no secret that the Pacific Northwest is the coffee capital of the world. There’s a coffee shop on every corner (sometimes two!), and a never-ending thirst for the latest and greatest new drink. The passion for coffee spills over into passion for soapmaking, so when we brought in the brand new Espresso Fragrance Oil, we went to work designing the most coffee-tastic soap we could.

The Espresso Fragrance Oil is a true espresso scent. Whereas Turkish Mocha has hints of sweetness and cream and Chocolate Espresso Cybilla is brimming with chocolate-y goodness, Espresso is for the coffee purist. Along with a recipe that includes Coffee Butter, Cocoa Butter, Hazelnut Oil and real coffee grounds, this is the ultimate soap for coffee lovers everywhere.

[Read more…]

Oatmeal, Milk and Honey Mantra Swirl Soap

April 25, 2013 Filed Under: Cold Process Soap

This soap is perfect for anyone with a sweet tooth. With a delectable combination of one of our favorite fragrances Oatmeal, Milk and Honey, paired with Chocolate Espresso Cybilla, this soap is reminiscent of a delightfully sweet mocha. We used a mantra swirl technique to give the finished soap an elegant look, and I think it may even look a bit like fluffy foam or whipped cream (can you tell I’m craving coffee?).

[Read more…]

For the Love of Coffee (Butter)

March 21, 2012 Filed Under: Cold Process Soap

There are so many unique and interesting ingredients hitting beauty products all over the market. We’ve moved way beyond just Shea Butter and Cocoa Butter. If you haven’t checked out our butters lately, take a gander; you’ll be surprised at how many we’ve grown to. Coffee Butter is just one of those fun and unique ingredients that we’re intrigued with. It’s luxurious, rich and it feels like it can wake you up on one whiff! Just the smell alone makes me smile. It’s perfect for a mocha lip balm, lotion, body butter or cold process soap recipe.

Recipe for Coffee Butter Cold Process Soap:

10 oz coconut oil

10 oz palm oil

12 oz olive oil

4 oz coffee butter

12 oz water

5.1 oz lye for a three pound batch

Silicone Loaf Mold

Cappuccino Mica

Copper Sparkle Mica

Titanium Dioxide

First Time Making Cold Process Soap?

I strongly suggest getting a couple of basic recipes under your belt before diving into this advanced recipe. There are serious safety considerations (gloves, goggles, no children or pets etc...) to take into account before you get your soaping groove on. Check out Soap Queen TV on Cold Process if you want to get started! It’s a 4 part series that will take you through the basics (and be sure to watch the episode on Lye Safety). If you’re a book worm, Bramble Berry also has some helpful reading on the cold process technique. Check out our E-Book on Cold Process.

This batch was split into three (uneven) layers. The bottom layer (the largest) is uncolored soap batter. The middle(ish) lighter (small) layer has a pinch of titanium dioxide and the top brown (small) layer is colored with the coffee grounds and Cappuccino Mica. Finally, the last layer is topped off with Copper Sparkle Mica. There is no fragrance oil added to the soap so you’ll get natural and subtle coffee scent with a light exfoliant from the coffee grounds in the top layer. If you want more “umph” to your scent, you can do Turkish Mocha in that top brown layer to help boost up your batch (keep it out of the light layers or else those light layers won’t stay light). Let us know if you’ve ever experimented with coffee soap! There are so many different ways that you can create a coffee soap recipe.

We’re Caffeine Addicts!

November 21, 2007 Filed Under: Bramble Berry News

I’ve been meaning to post these pictures for a few months. You can tell they’re a few months old because the sun is shining and we’re in summer clothes. Even dated, the news is still exciting!

The Bramble Berry team met the mistakes goal and on-time shipping goal for the first three quarters of this year. That means that they shipped out 98% of orders placed within 1 business day and less than .5% of those orders had mistakes. The team was duly rewarded with a big reward.

Pictured above is the new Latte/Espresso/Do Everything machine. Look how big it is! The “Do Everything” machine even has its own milk refrigerator to keep the milk fresh. It is a behemoth of a machine that requires a special power outlet.

The staff are running amok, all hopped up on caffeine and twittering like a bunch of supercharged monkeys. It’s good that the machine showed up, right in time for our super-busy season! Andrew (lead packer) is up to 4 shots of espresso per day. We’re seriously considering limiting his intake for his own safety.

Creamy Coffee Melt & Pour Soap

Find the supplies you need for this project below