This triple butter soap recipe makes the perfect premium bar: bubbly, lusciously creamy, and moisturizing, with a citrusy scent. It’s a fairly simple cold process soap recipe with luxuriously moisturizing results.
I rarely change up my cold process soap recipe. In fact, I’ve got my go-to recipe memorized.
For me, it just makes sense. I always have the basic soap oils on hand, and I’m usually in a hurry so I can whip up a batch super quick.
But every now and again, you get the hankering to try something new. I was wanting something luscious and a little bit special. That’s how this triple butter soap recipe came to be.
This triple butter soap recipe uses moisturizing cocoa, shea, and mango butters to give a rock hard bar that’s highly moisturizing.
Scented with litsea cubeba essential oil, this soap bar has an exquisite scent and feel—the perfect premium bar.
It also as a lovely rich superfat of 8%, which boosts its moisturizing quality even more. Bubbly, creamy, with a citrusy-green scent, what more could you want in a soap?
If you’ve never made cold process soap before, make sure you read up on the process first. I have an awesome step-by-step printable guide for you, to help you successfully get started with soap making.
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Moisturizing Triple Butter Soap Recipe – Cold Process Method
This recipe makes approximately 2 lbs. finished soap at an 8% superfat and slight water discount. You’ll get about 8 average-sized (4 oz.) bars.
Ingredients:
- 8 oz. coconut oil
- 8 oz. olive oil
- 5 oz. shea butter
- 5 oz. mango butter
- 4.5 oz. cocoa butter
- 1.5 oz. castor oil
- 4.3 oz. lye
- 13 oz. water
- 1 oz. litsea cubeba essential oil
PREP STEP: Prepare your workstation by covering with paper. Gather your supplies and ingredients. Put on your gloves and safety glasses.
STEP 1: Weigh out all oils and place into a stainless steel pot. Warm on low heat until just barely melted. Remove from heat and set aside.
STEP 2: Weigh out water into a heat-safe pitcher. Place this pitcher down into the sink.
STEP 3: Weigh out lye. In a slow, steady motion, pour lye into the pitcher of water and stir until dissolved. Please take care as this solution will get HOT very quickly.
Please remember your lye handling safety!
STEP 4: Let the lye solution and oils cool for at least 25 to 30 minutes, until they get to around 110 degrees Fahrenheit.
While you’re waiting, weigh out essential oil into a small glass jar or bowl. Set aside.
Also, use this time to prepare your mold, if needed.
STEP 5: Once the lye solution and oils have sufficiently cooled, pour the lye water into the pot of oils. With an immersion blender (AKA stick blender) blend until the batter comes to light trace (i.e. is even in color and the consistency of pancake batter).
STEP 6: Add the essential oil and stir until well incorporated.
STEP 7: Ladle or pour the soap batter into prepared mold. I like to use a chopstick or small spatula to give the surface of the soap a pretty textured swirl pattern, similar to frosting a cake.
STEP 8: Cover your mold with a lid or a piece of cardboard. (Don’t let the lid come in contact with the surface of the soap; if it will, it’s OK to leave the soap uncovered.) Let set in the mold for 48 to 72 hours.
STEP 9: After 48 to 72 hours have passed, unmold the soap. If the soap seems too soft and sticky to unmold, it’s perfectly OK to let set in the mold for a few more days.
Cut into bars and set out to cure for 30 days. After cure, your soap is ready to use. Enjoy your triple butter cold process soap!
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If you’re still feeling unsure about the whole soap making process, I’d love to personally walk you through it. Check out my online How To Make Soap from Scratch Course to learn everything you need to know to get started making your own beautiful handmade soap. Work through the course at your own pace PLUS get direct, personalized attention whenever you like. If this sounds like something you’re interested in, learn more about the course here.
Dear
Plz cp process soap u can mentioned in Indian quantity used materials .i m not getting oz?
Hi Amita! Thanks for your comment, I appreciate it. I will be updating the post to show both ounces and grams. Until then, here are the measurements for this recipe in grams:
I hope this helps you out. Happy soaping and let me know how you like this recipe!
Angela
Angela:
This recipe sound wonderful. Going to make it as soon as I get Olive oil. There seems to be a problem with getting it now. Some type of blight affecting the Olive tree.
Thanks again.
JoAnn
Ugh! I haven’t heard of that. 2020 strikes again!
U.S. based online soap making suppliers are still in stock, for anyone looking for olive oil now. I just checked Wholesale Supplies Plus and as of right now (11-16-2020) they are in stock.
Thanks so much for the olive oil update, JoAnn!
Hi
Is there any substitute for mango butter?
Hi Sanviti! Thanks for your question.
You can safely substitute the mango butter with more cocoa butter. Because mango butter and cocoa butter have the same SAP value, you do not have to recalculate the lye.
Another option, if you’d like to keep it a “triple” butter soap (and not a double butter 😉) is to swap the mango butter for kokum butter. It’s SAP value is similar enough to mango butter that it can be swapped without recalculating the lye. This recipe uses a 6% superfat so you have a bit of wiggle room with the lye amount.
I hope this helps! Let me know how your soap turns out.
Angela
Can i use any kind of essential oil?
In general, yes, you can use any type of essential oil. So if you don’t have litsea cubeba (or if you don’t care for the scent) you can substitute something else.
Just be aware that certain essential oils can accelerate trace (AKA make your soap batter thicken super quickly). I’ve had geranium, clove, and ylang ylang do this. So be ready to get the soap batter into the mold fast. 🙂
Also, before using an essential oil, make sure you check the IFRA guidelines for safe usage rates. Some essential oils (like cinnamon, cassia, clove, etc.) must be used at a much lower usage rate than the EO used in this recipe, in order to be safe on the skin.
If you aren’t sure of the usage rate for the particular essential oil you’re wanting to use, post it here and I’ll let you know how much to add in your soap.
Thanks so much for your question, Amanda! Happy soap making!
— Angela
Hi Angela,
Thanks for sharing your recipe.
I got dry and sensitive skin, Is these recipe high in cleansing or moisturizing? Will it dry the skin?
Thanks so much for your great question! This recipe makes a fairly balanced bar–it’s cleansing without being drying.
If your skin is especially dry and you find this recipe too cleansing for your liking, you can reduce the amount of coconut oil to 4 oz and increase the amount of olive oil to 12 oz. **REDUCE lye to 4.16 oz** and reduce water to 9 oz. This will increase the moisturizing properties of the soap while decreasing some of the cleansing properties.
But because soaps that are high in olive oil are much softer than coconut oil, you may want to add in sodium lactate to help make it easier to remove from the mold. Or you can let set in the mold for a week or more to firm up before removing.
I hope this helps! Once you make the soap, please let me know what you think of it. Happy soap making!
I made this soap a few weeks ago and just used it – LOVE IT! It lathers nice and feels great on my skin. Making some more today! I’ve had some issues with potash with some other recipes but not all all with this one!
Thank you for sharing this wonderful recipe!
Yay Conchetta! I’m so glad you like it! It’s one of my favorites, too. I’m happy it worked well for you and that you’re enjoying it. Thank YOU for taking the time to not only make my recipe, but coming back here to comment with your results. I appreciate it. 🙂
I tried this recipe twice & my soap trace gets thick and lumpy fast. Please let me know what can be causing this.
Hi Angela, I would like to make this recipe. At the beginning you said that it calls for a 8% superfat, but reading your suggestions in one of the comments, you said that it is 6% superfat. Which one should I use if wanting to double the recipe. Thank you so much for your time.
Hi Angela, sorry, I forgot to ask you. What is the lye water concentration for this recipe. Thank you so much.
Thanks for this recipe! Could you also share your favorite go-to recipe that you mentioned in the post? I am new to soap making and would love your tried and true favorite recipe to start with 🙂
This was my first cold process soap and I love it….. my only issue is that it turned brown. It still lathers and is super moisturizing but what did I do wrong!?
Hello,
New to soap making!
With certain ingredients in the soap recipe, like more butters, is it preferable to gel or not gel? I’ve read it’s sometimes about a cosmetic look, like deeper colors if you add them but was curious if certain ingredients work better for that process? Working temps can range from 90-130 so I was just curious if the 110 degrees in your instructions above was factoring in a preference of gel or no gel
Thanks for the recipe about, looks great!
This is one beautiful soap recipe—make as exactly as written and it turned out perfect! We all really love the scent.
Thank you so much for sharing.
Yvonne
Seasons’ Blessing to you and your family Angela
and Happy New Years!
Hello Ms. Angela
This recipe sounds absolutely yummy!! I have a couple of questions though. Does this batter trace quickly,since it has all of these butters,and at what temp should everything be at to remain fluid? Also could you put the ingredients in percentage? I would like to make a double batch. Thank you in advance. Happy New Year!!
I’ve made this many times without that happening. I soap about 100 degrees.
Thanks for sharing your experiences, Conchetta! It’s especially helpful to know the temp you soap at, so I appreciate you sharing.
HI! THanks for sharing your recipe! Is it alright not to put in castor oil? THanks!
Hi Shaine,
You can leave out the castor oil BUT you also have to add an additional 1.5 oz of coconut oil to make up for removing the castor oil (bringing the coconut to 9.5 oz total) AND up the lye to 4.35 oz, because coconut has a different SAP value.
If you’d like to swap the castor amount for a different oil, you can run the substituted recipe through a lye calculator. Bramble Berry has a very simple one here: Bramble Berry Lye Calculator
Happy soap making!
Angela