It’s been a long haul to get the oils to the UK this year – thanks to weeks of newly discovered complications and prevaricating from Greek officials. But they finally arrived, are safely bottled, and are now in the warehouse, waiting to be sent out to our valued customers. So apologies for the delay, but we’re now firing on all cylinders - or should I say, with a nod to Line of Duty’s Ted Hastings – we’re sucking oil…..
Our SOAP
The fascinating thing about our soap is how delicate it is – having the same characteristics of the AVLAKI organic extra virgin olive oil from which it’s made. Very light, the sweetest smell (though there are no added aromas to the mix), and excellently moisturising on the skin as it is so creamy, which is very comforting these days when handwashing is so important.
We’ve been very beady checking the ingredients listed on soap wrappings we see on sale, wondering what all the mix of extra ‘stuff’ really adds to the soap itself?
On searching for someone to make the soap for us, we discovered that what can be described as an olive oil soap could contain as little as 2% of oil: the rest from a soap ‘base’ of un-disclosed ingredients plus others such as….
Potassium Cocoate (Saponified Coconut Oil), Potassium Palm Kernelate (Saponified Palm Kernel Oil), Glycerin, Mentha Arvensis Oil, Potassium Hempseedate (Saponified Hemp Oil), Potassium Jojobate (Saponified Jojoba Oil), Mentha Piperita Oil, Citric Acid, Tocopherol (Vitamin E), Helianthus Annuus Seed Oil (Sunflower Oil), Limonene……….
And a lot of added smells.
We got to the bottom of that when a Greek friend showed us how to make olive oil soap in the traditional Greek method. The best oil for soap, he said, was old oil with the highest acidity count. But unfortunately, we noticed immediately, with the worst rancid smell.
Hence all those wonderful added aromas………..
The proper traditional way is millennia old: the Syrians knew about this centuries before the Romans. The saponifier (lye) is mixed with water and added to the olive oil, which has been gently heated and stirred until there is a ‘trace’ on the stirrer. This is poured into moulds and left to cure for at least five weeks, after which the alkalinity of the saponifier will have disappeared.
And the better the oil, the better the soap and the sweeter the smell.
It took us years to find Kevin Cole of the soap makers Cole and Co (www.coleandco.com)
who experimented with the traditional recipe and found the winning formula (thank you, Kevin) for our handmade soap bars: 65% AVLAKI organic extra virgin olive oil, 25% water, 10% saponifier, and a dash of salt….
So simple.