Scent #5 was my least favorite of the S.O.A.P. Panel fragrances out of the bottle. My initial impression was that it smelled a bit like neem oil. Later, I thought I detected some grass notes and a sort of earthiness. After I poured the fragrance out and let it “breathe” for a few minutes, the strongest note I could detect was a grass note, followed by a sort of earthy dirt scent.
As I did with fragrances 1-4, I used a recipe of 45% olive, 25% coconut, 25% palm, and 5% castor oils. The oils were about 90 degrees and the lye mixture was about 100 degrees when I combined them. I used full water in the lye mixture. I used the full bottle of fragrance, which was 26 grams.
I blended to a very light trace.
Then I added the fragrance oil. There were no issues with acceleration, discoloration, or ricing. Indeed, I can’t tell the difference between the soap before and after the fragrance and had to double-check the time on the picture to be sure.
I expected this fragrance to misbehave, but it soaped beautifully. I poured it into the mold and put it away to gel. It actually took quite a long time to gel, so this fragrance should give anyone time to play.
I unmolded it the next day (a little hastily, hence some bent corners that needed a quick bit of reshaping). As you can see, still no discoloration.
There is a little bit of soda ash on the top, as I neglected to spray the tops with alcohol. The scent is still quite strong, but the earthy dirt notes have retreated a bit. It really smells exactly like grass after saponification, and it’s scent remains very true—no morphing at all. It would go well with a nice grass green color. It might be fun as a novelty soap, perhaps for a golfer, but I am just not loving it. I’m giving it a thumbs up for its behavior in the soap, but a big thumbs down on the scent. I think, however, that some folks who really love the scent of fresh cut grass would enjoy it.