Yellowdock - 1, 2, 3

In our mission to get the raspberry red that some online soapers have been getting with yellowdock root, we have tried three times.

Our first attempt was a half pound batch with yellowdock infused coconut oil as 10% of the total oils. The infusion steeped for 1 week and was not very strong. The result was a very light raspberry pink soap with a slight orangey brown discoloration in the center (the discoloration is not really visible in the picture). It was disappointing at first but after curing for a while the soap has evened out and become consistently light pink throughout.

This is what it looked like:

This is what it looks like now:

Our second attempt was another half pound batch with 0.5 tsp of yellowdock powder added at trace. The result was nowhere near what we were looking for. The top of the soap was pinkish while the inside had that same orangey brown discoloration. It has been curing for about a week and a half now and the color seems to be evening out as well.

This is what it looked like when it gelled:

This is what it looked like right after cutting:

This is what it looks like now after about 10 days of curing:

For our third attempt we went into overdrive with the yellowdock oil. We made a new infusion with 10 oz of coconut oil and 1 oz of yellowdock powder. We let this steep for just over 2 weeks until the oil was so dark that you could no longer see through it. We then used the infusion as 30% of our half pound batch and these are the results:

This is what it looked like right after pouring:

This is what it lookd like right after cutting:

This is what it looked like today after washing the ash away:

Not sure how went from pink to a tomato carrot orange but the disappointing truth is that we were again, unsuccessful. It has not had a chance to cure now but maybe it will mellow away from orange after a while.