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Goat Milk Soap Recipe

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This cold process bar combines goats milk with shea butter, olive oil, and more. A gentle, cleansing, beautiful soap recipe.

A step-by-step tutorial for a nourishing and natural cold process soap. You’ll love this goat milk soap recipe.

3 bars goat milk soap on blue wood surface

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Ingredients

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I recommend Nurture Soap for lye, oils, fragrance, and colors. They are affordable and you can get fragrances and colors in small quantities if you want.

Equipment

🍴Instructions

Preparing the goat milk, oils and lye

frozen goat milk, pouring lye on top, unmelted oils in pot, fully melted oils in pot

Okay, my friends, let’s make this! If you’ve made soap before, it will all seem very familiar, with one big, weird exception: goat’s milk!

We can’t just go pouring lye into the milk, and here’s why: when you add lye to any liquid, it will shoot way up in temperature because of the chemical reaction. If this happens with milk, there can be an unpleasant reaction like curdled milk. No thanks.

So first we want to get the milk to a semi-frozen, slushy state. Just put it in the freezer for about four hours, until it is partially frozen.

Then we proceed. Carefully measure out the lye and pour it into the milk. You’ll need to stir quite a bit, but almost instantly the ice will start to melt and the milk will heat up and perhaps change color.

Set aside the lye milk in a safe place, and being measuring and melting your oils. Everything has to be thoroughly melted and should be about 140 degrees.

Let both components cool for an hour or two, until they are about 110 degrees. (Anywhere from 100-125 is acceptable.)

Stick Blending and pouring

grid of 4 images: melted oil in pot, stick blender mixing, soap batter being poured into mold, unmolded white loaf of soap

It’s time for the fun part! Before you start blending, make sure your mold, fragrance oil, and any other additions are ready to go.

Pour the milk into the melted oils, and begin stick blending. Blend for a few minutes until trace is reached. The batter should thicken slightly and leave trails when stirred or when the stick blender is lifted.

Once you’ve reached trace, stir in the fragrance (if using) by hand and immediately pour the batter into the mold. Smooth out the top.

Because of the sugars in the milk, this soap will get hot! To avoid cracking or any other problems, I’d recommend you put this in the fridge or freezer.

After 24 hours, turn the soap out of the mold (it may still be a bit soft), cut into bars, and store in a well-ventilated space for a few weeks.

You will love it.

Storage instructions

This soap does best if you store it in a cool, dry place with plenty of air circulation. I like to use a shoebox with layers of newspaper.

overhead view of cut bars homemade soap

🔍 FAQs

What is the benefit of making soap with goat’s milk?

Like anything in the soap-making world, there are a lot of opinions about this! Many people argue that all the vitamins and minerals in milk benefit your skin, and many say that none of those minerals can be found in a finished bar. Either way, goat’s milk does contain a good amount of lactic acid, which is a natural exfoliant and can help give you glowing skin, improve acne, and make you look younger.

What other ingredients do we need?

Just any cold process soap, we still need lye and oils. You can actually make any cold process soap into goat soap by replacing some or all of the water in the recipe with milk.

Can I make this soap without lye?

Well, technically, no. You can’t make soap without lye. But you can absolutely buy pre-made goat milk soap base, customize it with fragrance and color, and pour it into the mold of your choice. No need to handle lye.

What if I don’t have access to fresh goat’s milk?

No problem! Just get the powdered kind, mix it with water, and you’re off to the races.

👩🏻‍🍳 Expert tips

  • Don’t skip the step of freezing the goat milk. It will scorch when the lye hits it otherwise.
  • Be sure to have your mold, fragrance, and colors ready to go before you start stick blending.
  • Feel free to add extra goodies at trace. Try ground oatmeal, jojoba beads, or poppyseeds.

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📖 Here’s the recipe

here’s the recipe

close up of 1 bar homemade off white soap
4.69 from 29 votes

Nourishing Goat Milk Soap Recipe

Print Recipe
This cold process bar combines goats milk with shea butter, olive oil, and more. A gentle, cleansing, beautiful soap recipe.
Prep Time:1 hour
curing time:1 day
Total Time:1 day 1 hour
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Equipment

Ingredients

  • 3 ounces almond oil
  • 2 ounces castor oil
  • 10 ounces coconut oil
  • 10 ounces olive oil
  • 6 ounces palm oil
  • 3 ounces shea butter
  • 1 ounce beeswax
  • 4.91 ounces lye
  • 12 ounces goat milk (or combine 1 ounce powdered goat milk and 11 ounces water)

Instructions

  • Prepare the goat milk by freezing for a few hours until it reaches a slushy consistency.
  • Add the lye to the partially frozen milk and stir until completely blended. It will melt, heat up, and may change color. Set aside in a safe place.
  • Measure the oils, butters, and beeswax and melt over low heat until completely melted and heated to 140 degrees. Set aside to cool. Prepare your soap mold and any color or fragrance you are using.
  • When the milk and oils have cooled to about 110 degrees, pour the milk into the melted oils and blend using a stick blender. Mix until "trace" is achieved, or the soap thickens slightly and a trail of soap rests on top of the batter rather than immediately sinking in. Add desired fragrance or color, stirring in by hand.
  • Pour into soap mold, gently smoothing out top. Place in fridge or freezer to avoid cracking. Un-mold after 24 hours, cut into bars, and allow to cure for 2 weeks before using.

Notes

To resize this recipe, enter the following percentages into a soap calculator: 8.57% almond oil, 5.71% castor oil, 28.57% coconut oil, 28.57% olive oil, 17.14% palm oil, 8.57% shea butter, 2.86% beeswax.
Be sure to follow safe soap making: wear gloves, googles. long sleeves. and work in a well-ventilated space.  Take care that any raw soap or lye stays out of the reach of children. 
Keyword: cold process soap with goats milk, goat millk soap recipe, how to make goat milk soap
Servings: 10 bars
Author: Katie Shaw
Did you make this recipe?If you loved it, please leave a review!

Enjoy your soapmaking!

signature with strawberries
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36 thoughts on “Goat Milk Soap Recipe”

  1. 5 stars
    Okay, so I’ll be making this tomorrow. I will not be using palm oil because I don’t have any. I’m going to increase a couple of the other oils to keep the percentage the same. I will also add some raw honey. My goat’s milk is in ice cubes and that’s is how I’ll be using them as I have watched quite a few videos on the subject. I really love your recipe it looks amazing. Please let me know how much honey you would recommend to add to this recipe to not throw it off and reap the benefits of raw honey to the bars of soap.

    Reply
  2. Can I increase the amount of Shea butter and use Cocoa Butter in place of the palm oil. Like 3 ounces Shea and 3 ounces Cocoa.

    Reply
    • I’ve made goats milk soap twice and as recommended froze the milk but when the lye was added the temp only went to 20 degrees centigrade and even with the added honey didn’t raise much higher. Any thoughts on why this was

      Reply
  3. Quick question: if you were to give these away as gifts or sell them, how would you package them for storing? I’ve been looking on the internet and can’t find anywhere that answers that question. I was thinking maybe parchment paper?

    Reply
    • Hey Melanie, It’s hard to say because when you order all the ingredients you’ll have enough to make multiple batches, each batch will make about 8-10 bars depending on how you cut them. The prices vary sooooo much for supplies. I would say less than $1.50 per bar assuming you have the scale, blender, etc.

      Reply
  4. Hey Katie!
    Thanks so much for the recipe.. excited about trying goat milk soap.
    One question.. how much fragrance oil would I put in? Sorry if I missed it🤪Thank you!❤️
    Mary

    Reply
  5. 1 star
    Just so you know, nobody reads the dumb 4 book description of why you love each ingredient. It’s just super annoying to have to scroll through pages of literature just to get to the recipe because you want to write your life story, why you like each ingredient, and how many dumb life lessons you feel are associated with soap… Try putting the recipe first and your autobiography after so people that just want the recipe can get it without being waterboarded with your life story.

    Reply
  6. We are making soap in my ag class and we were wondering if instead of lye if we could use the liquid soap that’s already pre-made in a bottle and it still work the same.

    Reply
  7. I made this soap and it cracked down the middle even though I put it right in the fridge :(. Any way to salvage it? Thanks for the very clear directions, this is my first time making cold process soap.

    Reply
  8. Hi, thanks so much for sharing your knowledge and beautiful recipes. I’m just wondering if there may be an alternative to palm oil in soap recipes, perhaps your goats milk recipe as an example as I’d really like to try this but without palm oil. Could you please possibly suggest an alternative that will still make a beautiful bar, thank you very much in advance 😊

    Reply
    • Hi Angela: I have two palm-free recipes that I make a lot: search the site for Lemon Soap recipes (it’s a little softer) and bay soap recipe. Just follow the instructions here for the goats milk and then use the oils from one of the palm-free soaps 😊

      Reply
    • 5 stars
      Thank you so much for sharing your gift. My goat soap and all of your recipes have worked to perfection!!! I am so ready for Christmas and everybody is excited

      Reply
  9. Hi there,
    I am defiantly interested in making soap with this recipe, but I have a question. Can I use cold process extra virgin olive oil and unrefined coconut oil?

    Reply
  10. I have enjoyed reading this and more interested to make the soap both for sell and for my own house , however I need more lessons from you is it possible to meet

    Reply
  11. Hi. Thank you so much for all the info and especially for sharing this recipe. Is it possible for you to give me the recipe in grams measurements please. I am from South Africa and I am not familiar with ounces. Thank you again.

    Reply
  12. Thank you for your help in sharing your recupes, got a questian, when you put the soap in the fridg or, freezer do you leave it there for the 24 hours? Thanks again

    Reply

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