Goat milk soap is everywhere.

Most every shop sells it: big or small.

But why does it all look so different.

I‘m sure you’ve seen the brownish, tan colored bars. That’s pretty much what people think of when they think, “I want to buy goat milk soap.” Let’s face it, very few people buy it because it’s pretty.  But it could be.

So why is it brown? Quite simply, the sugars in the goats milk have caramelized and become brown. It affects the looks, but not the way the soap works or the benefits of the goats milk. By the way, any soap containing sugars will do this. 

Ok, you’re thinking, then why do some people have white goats milk soap? There are two answers.

1. The soap contains very little goat milk and is added after the initial water and lye is mixed. Meaning there is very little sugar to caramelize, and very little milk to benefit your skin. 

Bubbly!

2. The goat milk is handled in such a way that it never heats up past a certain temperature during the saponification process. More time and care in the crafting, but the same benefits as the brown soap you might be expecting. 

Brown goats milk soap is like homemade pudding gone sideways. You can still eat it when the eggs or cornstarch have scrambled to make a lumpy mess  It doesn’t look good and the texture is “off.”  However, it will sustain life and it won’t hurt you when used properly. But it's possibly not your favorite thing either.

**** There is one more special case that applies to all soap makers. Some fragrances and essential oils can discolor to tan or brown. Things like coffee, vanilla, or cinnamon scents will change any soap brownish.*****

Slightly brown bar on left is an early learning attempt

Clearly from my soap pictures, I make white goat milk soap; or as I call it, cream colored. 

I finally got it figured out

When I think of goat milk, I think of creamy goodness. And when I went about designing and formulating my recipes, I wanted to ensure that’s what my finished product looked like. So I have spent years researching and testing to find a way that kept my soap beautiful and creamy in spite of the high temperatures it could reach. The result is a creamy soap that looks as good as it is for you. So you will find that creamy, pure color in my bars of soap. 

Four gallons of farm fresh goodness

On the plus side, keeping a cream colored base allows me to add almost any color to the soap and get a true color. Most brown soaps don’t take colors well. Let’s face it, brown just doesn’t mix well with anything to make a gorgeous blue.😁

Additionally, you really can’t add something like titanium dioxide and get white if your soap heats up too much. It just makes light brown, not cream. In fact, I never add titanium dioxide to my cream colored soap. The titanium dioxide you will see in my ingredient list is pre-mixed in the colorants that I buy. For example, the pink mica that I use is made up of mica, titanium dioxide and iron oxide. It kind of seems like a no-brainer since red(iron oxide) and white(titanium dioxide) make pink. Basic elementary color mixing 😏

So what goat milk soap is BEST? To get the full benefits from the goat milk, your soap bar doesn’t have to be brown or white, but goat milk SHOULD be one of the first few ingredients- it could even be fourth in line and still be plentiful in the soap. If you notice it down where the colors or fragrances are on the ingredient list, then probably only a bit was added to the end. 

no colorants were used in this soap

So now you know! White goats milk soap is available and it’s just as good as it’s brown counterpart. So read the ingredients and goat your soap!