When Cocoa Loco went Uh Oh

If I had all kinds of super expensive fancy equipment to test my products, I would be able to finish developing them a lot faster.

My products are all tested 'in real time'. Sometimes that means having to dump a product after months of it 'behaving nicely'. Some products will actually fool you and behave nicely for what seems like forever – then go wonky (practically) overnight.


My latest lip balm did just that. It suddenly went grainy after 5 steady months of non-stop, problem-free use.

Sigh.

Back to the drawing board.

Shoot the Shea

I know what the problem is, and I am going to have to drop the one ingredient I was most pleased about bringing into this formula: shea butter.

Regardless of which supplier I order from, shea has always been a bucket of worms to work with. In some combinations and with some production methods, it's pretty consistent (even though it always needs to be treated like a baby).

Where it really gets iffy is with warmer temperatures. You can't make a lip balm without involving temperatures.

Every wax and butter has a different melting point. To get the perfect texture and stability, things have to be done in a certain order and the temp must be monitored constantly. And even if you've checked and double checked and worked uninterrupted with the concentration of a safecracker, it still goes wrong sometimes.

Next batch will be shea free.

Stay tuned.

PS: There's still a bit of time to get in on this giveaway