Well, I did both for a time. Started with M&P, added CP, then discontinuned it, & just stuck with M&P.
Several reasons involved.

• First, I am way to impatient to wait 4-6 weeks before I can wrap & sell the CP.
• My M&P is highly scented, & at the craft shows I sell WAY more M&P than CP, because the colors are more viberant, & the scent stronger.
• M&P is more forgiving of boo-boo's than CP-measurements don't have to be as exact & you still get a good result.
• I was really disapointed with some of the batches of CP. If you add color, you might have a really great color when you pour, but 24 hrs later its totally different, & by 4 weeks later it can be a whole other shade altogether.
• Also, scent is totally different in CP than in M&P. I can use the exact same scent, in the same preportions, in a batch of each kind of soap & get 2 completely DIFFERENT scents. The chemical recation caused during the saponification process has a tendency to change some scents really drastically. Make sure you use a brand/scent that has been tested in CP soap, because some scents will cause the CP soap to seize up. Not all lavenders, magnolias etc are the same.

Best bet is to try both & see what YOU like to do. Some people LOVE making CP, some hate it. I do have a recipe to make HP soap, which you can use pretty much immediately, BUT I haven't gotten around to playing with it......
For me, personally, I like knowing that I can sit down & in a little over 2 hours have 60 bars of soap done in a bunch of different scents, as opposed to stirring a batch of CP forever & getting 28 bars of the same scent of soap.

Good luck with your first batch of CP. Let us know how it turns out--we want pictures! LOL!! (We always want pictures!)

Hazel

Ditto what Hazel said. My sentiments, exactly. I have never tried HP, either, but I may give it a shot someday.
Susan

Hazel & Susan- Confuse me just tiny bit more :) what the heck is hp soap?

The reason I started this thread was because my source for beef suet fell through. Now I need to rethink what I'm going to do.

Can any of you give me a basic recipe for a first time soap maker? Any kind of "p" you use and can guide me through making mine will be fine! lol!

Thanks!
Connie

Connie,
Hot process soap is made with the basic same ingredients as cold process. The only difference is it is process with heat, either stovetop or crockpot. It is heated to a higher temp than CP & when it is set up it is basically useable. (If you check google or another search engine & type in hot process soapmaking you can probably get tons of info)

The same with CP-search engines will have tons of recipies, most make with vegetable shortening & olive oil, and/or coconut, & palm oils. Basic recipes have vegetable shortening & oilve oil, lye & water.

I have added a link for the crockpot method for HP soapmaking for you to check out. Some of the pics aren't there, but....
Hope this helps somewhat.........

Hazel

Here is a link that might be useful: crockpot soapmaking

The M&P soap is more"crafty", and the CP soap is more pioneerish. You do not use lye with M&P (this can be the dangerous part). If you have little ones around, kids or pets, extra precautions need to be followed.

HP, hot process, is carried out the same as CP, but as was mentioned already, there is additional heat added from an external source.Once you have made CP soap you will know about the extra heat comment.
HP can be a little finicky than CP and until you get good at it, it will look more "rustic" than CP, but you can use almost immediately.
I used to be on some forums (many have died a long the way), but the last one I participated in was www.thesoapdish.com
hth

I, too, find the Soap Dish helpful at times but it seems to me that it targets mostly the CP/HP soapmakers. I make M&P and rebatched soap. A forum that is very useful to me is bathandbeautyforums.com. They have much better coverage of M&P soapmaking than the soapdish does, although that forum is not as active as it once was.
Susan

Personally, I use M&P for safety reasons;I don't want to handle lye in my kitchen. And also for convenience- it's already soap, so you just have to add color and scent to get what you want. I suggest letting it cure, but all that is needed is about 24 hours, not weeks.

Hi Country Girl, I am seeing no responses here so I'll chime in. M&P does not require any lye, just melt and pour, and M&P (imo) is more crafty. You are able to add designs and inserts on and into the bars when they're being made. Lye can be dangerous, potential hazard to self, children and animals, storage may be a problem as well if you have excess lye around. hth

This is a note on Hazel's comment about stirring your arm off. Without a lot of money you can pick up a stick blender from a thrift shop for a couple of bucks; I bought 2 of them for $8 Cdn, and I am still using the first one for the last 6(?) 7 years. With these I can bring 10 pounds of soap to trace in less than 15 minutes (with a water discount, of course). Also, having a good scale is a necessity for accurate measuring; not those spring scales, please!With an accurate scale you will not have to rebatch the mistakes and waste a lot of time not only grating the booboos, but wondering where the heck you made a mistake when the soap doesn't turn out:)

I thought I'd chime in as a pro CP person. I've done both methods, but personally prefer CP because I like the feeling of making something from scratch. I know what goes into my soap from beginning to end, which is great for me since I have sensitive skin.

CP is definitely a lot more labor intensive than M&P, but I find it relaxing and therapeutic.

It's also much more complicated since you're working with lye, and ingredients that you might put into M&P soap with no problem will turn out all different sorts of ways when you introduce it to lye.

It's even MORE complicated if you're interested in designing your own soap recipe because it involves balancing chemical reactions and understanding the various properties of different oils. I love it, though, because it appeals to my geeky side. And once you learn it, it's not that difficult.

Anyway, I agree with Hazel. Try both and see what you personally like. You might want to start with M&P to break yourself into the whole experience. That's how I started. I later moved into CP once I'd tried M&P.

Good luck!

Is the melt & por Soaps an all natural soaP ? I was looking for goats milk M&P and was just wondering.

Thanks

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I am 69 years old and started making soap earlier this year. I know that I am not as sharp as I used to be, so I prefer to avoid the use of lye or anything else that might create a problem. The clumsiness that has manifested itself with me says that M&P is the way to go.