Houston we have HOT soap

Mission accomplished! If you've followed all the brother sister projects we've done over the years you know my brother and I have done some fun and crazy things. He recently got into gardening and took that to a new level. A year or so ago he had an abundance of peppers and asked if I could incorporate them into soap, and the answer is of course I can. I'll put ghost peppers in but not glitter, go figure.

He wanted a soap that was hot on the skin (don't ask why) and no matter what we tried it was not happening. Capsaicin was lost to the process of saponification. I tried so many peppers he gave me- Scotch Bonnets, Scorpions, Chocolate Habaneros and the final try was with 20 Ghost Peppers. I had soap in so many lovely shades of salmon, peach and orange.....but no heat. None. 20 Ghost Peppers laughed in my face and disappeared into the soap only to be lost forever, merely lending their color.

I told a friend about this dilemma - I was now fired up and determined to get hot soap. A friend, Chef Tony who owns and operates Cafe 25:35 in Buckeye, AZ, suggested a culinary product called The Source. It's a pepper concentrate, almost a reduction, the texture of a paste/gel that he uses to create hot dressings and sauces. He said if anything was ever going to create hot soap this was it, it's the hottest thing he's come across. A few weeks later he gifted a bottle to me and off we went down the rabbit hole of hot soap once more.

Using just 1/2 teaspoon in each batch I created a hot process and a cold process batch. As few variables as possible, no color added, left unscented and "plain". The color you see is from the pepper concentrate! We have a wicked shade of salmon, and thus the batch was named Wicked. It was given to a few select people to test (my brother first) and once it passed his test it was tried here. Two very kind friends have tested it and last week two bars made it to the hands of Chef Tony, who is currently refusing to use it. Reactions range from my brothers "it was like tear gas went off in my shower" to nothing at all, to some coughing and laughing and coughing some more. "I'm afriad to wash my bits with this" to what the heck I'll do that, then regretting it. Some felt hardly any sting, some bits burned for 10+ minutes out of the shower.

Some genius washed her face with it thinking why not? Then couldn't open her eyes fully for at least 5-10 minutes afterward (there's a video of that aftermath haha to serve as a warning) and wow you want to talk about dry skin? That was crazy, body was totally fine but face was dry dry dry immediately after use. (It might have been me who is the genius here.....) So - great for oily skin! HAHAHA.

And in the end it's thrilling, so many people have told me to put it up for sale. I've held off on this........................but they say they want it and it's a novelty. Well there are but 6 bars left so they're officially up. Would I do it again? YUP. Will I use the rest of the bar in my shower? Maybe by Christmas. If you want this---BEWARE THIS BAR IS HOT and HOT ON THE SKIN. In fact probably I should say things like DO NOT USE. DO NOT BUY. DO NOT PUT ON SKIN. Don't look at it wrong. Make it a sandwich if it wants one. Don't get it wet. Don't put it in your house. Don't get it near your body. Keep out of reach of children, pets and all things living, in fact keep it away from house plants too.

But? Houston we have HOT SOAP. Mission accomplished.