This coffee scrub soap is an easy recipe to follow. But if this is your first time making soap, I would recommend you tried the basic soap with only 4 ingredients first.

About Coffee in Soap

The soap is made out of real coffee by substituting water with coffee. The stronger you make your coffee, the more color your finished soap will have. If you like the color really brown, put a teaspoon of cocoa powder in as well.
Used coffee grounds are an outstanding skincare component and will give your soap extra cleansing power as well as exfoliating abilities.

If you want to have a real scent of coffee in the finished soap, you need to buy Coffee Oil and use 3-5%

Coffee Scrub Soap Recipe

Equipment

  • 2 plastic, glass, or steel bowls
  • Microwave oven
  • Wooden or plastic spoon
  • Silicone molds
  • Stick blender
  • Safety gear
  • pH meter or test strips
  • Thermometer
  • Kitchen scale

Materials

Instructions

  1. Read the soaping safely page, if you haven´t already
  2. Make coffee and let it cool
  3. Dissolve NaOH in the brewed coffee by slowly adding the NaOH to the coffee and stirring gently with the spoon. Leave the Lye (this is what the mixture is called now) to cool down
  4. Melt coconut oil and shea butter and mix it with olive and castor oils
  5. Wait until the lye is between 86 and 104 degrees F (30-40 degrees C) and heat up the oils to approx the same temperature if needed
  6. Mix the oils and the lye by slowly pouring oils into the lye
  7. Use a stick blender for 1-5 minutes until light trace
  8. The coffee grounds and blend until the grounds are well mixed in the batter and there is a trace
  9. Pour your batter into a mold or molds as you prefer
  10. Check if the soap is firm enough to cut after 24 hours
  11. Cut the soap bars (if you used a big mold) and trim the edges
  12. Leave to cure eg in a paper bag for 4 – 6 weeks and check pH. Store it at room temperature
Decoration idea – put a couple of coffee beans on top while the batter is still soft

Soap Bar Quality

Soap Bar QualityRangeThis Recipe
Hardness29 – 5442
Cleansing12 – 2220
Conditioning44 – 6954
Bubbly14 – 4629
Creamy16 – 4831
Iodine41 – 7055
INS136 – 165153

Soap characteristics

Lauric14
Myristic6
Palmitic8
Stearic14
Ricinoleic9
Oleic38
Linoleic6
Linolenic0
Why use coffee grounds as well as brewed coffee?

The coffee grounds will give your soap an exfoliating effect and add nourishing skin benefits from the coffee. The brewed coffee will ad a nice brown color to the soap and add some of the benefits to the skin. You can leave one or booth out if you prefer.

Why do I have to wait for the coffee to cool down?

When mixing lye with any liquid, it will result in a lot of heat. To prevent the lye from boiling and spill, you need to mix it with cool coffee.

What can I use a coffee soap for?

This soap is perfect for anyone who does garden or greasy mecanical work and gets filthy hands. It is also a great exfoliating soap to eliminate dead skin cells or hard skin under the feet.

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